For those who want to have their memories tickled, or want to be tempted.
See the Reference at the end of the article for a NY Times comprehensive Guide to Rome; including a 10 photo slide show, Maps, Sights and Activities, Restaurants, Hotels, Entertainment, Shopping, Travel Tips, Additional articles, Exchange Rate, and Weather.

OUR first family trip to Italy was a big success. We had gone to Venice, where the sunny disposition of our son, Mitchell, charmed all we met. Mitchell sat patiently through long days and leisurely meals. We never felt claustrophobic in our little hotel room. Of course, he was 7 months old.

Now he's 11 years old. My wife, Susan, and I had long talked about another trip to Italy.

We decided to go in April, during Mitchell's spring break from fifth grade.

But where in Italy? A drive among hill towns would suit us adults, but that's a lot of car time for a boy. It would be better to stay in one spot. We settled on Rome, where there would be plenty to see and do.

As for lodging, there were triple hotel rooms - with a double and a single bed - available in the historic center, where we wanted to stay, but the least expensive was more than $300 a night.

So we decided to look into an apartment: more room, the option of eating in. I had visions of a refrigerator stocked with prosciutto and white wine, all ready for an easy and relaxed meal "at home."...

[RAA NOTE: I have omitted certain following paragraphs as they seemed like a commercial for a rental service or a particular apartment. In summary, rooms at a hotel were  $300 a day, $270 for an apartment,  trading the greater elegance of the hotel, vs the kitchen and living room of the rustic apartment, and being "imbedded" as a local.]

We walked to a cafe on the Piazza Navona, maybe three minutes away. At 8:30 a.m. on a rainy Saturday, the oblong piazza with its Baroque fountains was less crowded than we'd see it again. We got a look at the Bernini Fountain of the Four Rivers in the middle without the tour groups, fortune tellers and vendors of every kind of artwork and gewgaw who usually arrived in late morning and swirled around well past our bedtime.

In fact, to the east of our apartment was a solid strip of restaurants, bars, boutiques and ice cream shops that led right to the Piazza Navona, and it all went into full cry starting in the afternoon. In the morning, there were temporary fruit and vegetable stands nearby. To the west and north the narrow cobblestoned streets stayed quiet all day. They were lined mainly with three- and four-story residences like ours, some galleries and antiques shops and the occasional jewel of a church or little piazza.

The narrow streets protected us from Rome's infamously buzzing traffic. We often had to walk single file, or even step aside, to accommodate a slow-moving motor scooter, but it was all "After you, Alfonso," as vehicles and pedestrians waited politely for one another to pass.

Our immediate commercial neighbors included a cleaners, a butcher shop and a grocery far larger and better stocked than the hole-in-the-wall food shops around. I was excited to see a refrigerated glass case full of cheeses and meats; I made a mental shopping list for my fantasy cold buffet.

The chance to cook and eat at home is an obvious advantage of a rental. So too is space; we had probably quadruple the area of a hotel room for less money. There are some obvious disadvantages, too.

Besides unmade beds, there's no front desk to help with reservations or directions. But with some maps, guidebooks and a few memorized Italian phrases, we booked tables on the phone and found bus routes...

After we returned from our second day's outing - a walk to the Piazza del Popolo for a memorable lunch at Dal Bolognese and a long, winding amble back, taking in the Trevi Fountain, the Spanish Steps and, for the second time in two days, the Pantheon (our near neighbor about 10 minutes' walk away)...

Each morning I'd make coffee - on the stovetop espresso maker, thank you - just to get me out the door to get more coffee. I'd walk the half-block to the Antico Caffè della Pace. The cafe, on a small street with the lovely Santa Maria della Pace church, is popular with the young and chic Romans. But at that hour, it was people with a briefcase in one hand and an espresso cup in the other. Then I would visit a pastry shop for a doughnut (bombolone) for Mitchell and some rolls. A couple of mornings, I walked to the Campo dei Fiori market, about 10 minutes away, to buy flowers for the dining room.

Then, we were tourists. We visited the Colosseum; the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill on a glorious day when I wished we'd packed a picnic; and the Vatican Museum, where Mitchell seemed spellbound as we whispered the Bible stories painted on the ceiling. We poked our heads into churches to see Caravaggios and Raphaels. Except for the Borghese Gallery and the Catacombs of St. Callisto, which we reached by taxi, we walked or rode buses, always nudging each other when we caught sight of ancient columns or an excavation along the way.

Our longest outing was a half-day at Ostia Antica, the ruins of the ancient port city, which we reached by bus, subway and commuter train, an hour door to door and just a euro each way.

After the morning sightseeing and lunch, Susan would visit some shops...

Then it was out for dinner, and back for some television before bed. Our favorite show starred a man who talked a lot, made some funny faces and then burst into Sinatra songs in English.

We'd go to sleep with the sound of perhaps 10,000 people in the streets below talking over dinner or cones of gelato. It made for a sort of white noise that didn't disturb us at all. Were it warmer and the windows open, I'm not sure I'd be able to say the same.

In my daily trips to the local grocery, I always lingered by the meats and cheeses.

[RAA NOTE: I am going to omit frequent comments about their son Mitchell's obsession with pizza and pasta :)]

We ate out every lunch and dinner.... And all of it heavenly.

A couple of days before we left, I did it. I bought some prosciutto, soppressata, bresaola, gorgonzola, buffalo mozzarella and a Sardinian sheep's-milk cheese whose name I didn't catch. I stored it in the fridge, figuring that at least on our last evening, Sunday, we'd want to take it easy while we packed.

...I called Dal Bolognese and reserved a second Sunday lunch.

Rain kept us from the sidewalk table I'd asked for, so we ate inside with other families who live in Rome. Mitchell said his papardelle with duck-meat sauce was the best pasta he'd ever had. I'll have to trust him; he wouldn't give me even a taste. "Where are we going to go on our next vacation?" he asked.

"Let's vote while we have our dinner at home tonight," I replied.

"Daddy," he said. "Pizza."

Carl Sommers is an editor in the Travel section.
 

The New York Times > Travel > There's No Place Like Rome
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