3 Solo Days of Activities in Rome

I settled in the Trastevere district of Rome in an extra room of an acquaintance who is never home. This allowed me to wander the streets in the mornings looking for coffee, exploring the local merchants, architecture, and flower boxes of this urban neighborhood. Knowing that Rome is a big city with many pockets, I booked a group food & bike tour experience for one full day that took me all over the city. We saw landmarks and historical sites like the Colosseum and the Victor Emmanuel II Monument. While there, we saw the tiny balcony where Mussolini dictated to crowds of people in the street. Since this was a food tour, the goal was to take breaks at local eateries for tastes of Italy. We missed the Porta Portese, an outdoor market that’s only open on Sundays, but we ducked in a local cafe nearby for coffee and cornettos in the morning, a pizza snack in Tempio Maggiore that was cheesy and satisfying, and gelato from Cafe Gioliti, “the best in the city” according to our guide. We got a great feel and layout of Rome, and thankfully managed to navigate traffic and tourists! We had the perfect lunch at the Testaccio Market—cacio e pepe and limoncello—and light snacks picked up from the stalls made for a simple dinner that night.

The next day, I booked a group guide and walking tour of the Colosseum, Palatine Hill, and the Forum, which was a definitive and transformative experience that, to this day, still leaves me in wonder. The architecture dwarfed me. Imagining Caesar himself walking these same steps—it’s hard to believe. But did he walk 20,000 steps a day? Because my tracker told me I had. After a full day of sites, I was famished. Dinner in Trastevere at Pasta e Vino was an obvious and easy choice, and their homemade pasta carbonara with a glass of red wine was swoon-worthy.

On my last and final day, I could not miss the Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel. I booked another group tour, and we had plenty of time to take in the art, paintings, and gardens over the course of several hours. Seeing Michelangelo frescos truly left me speechless with their bright colors and flecks of gold paint. As a bonus, our guide was able to get us into the basement, where we saw a century of “Pope mobiles” from horse-drawn carriages to the modern, bullet-proof car of today. The Vatican City grounds are beautifully maintained and art is everywhere you look.