Probably the most iconic site in Rome, the Colosseum was high on my list of places to visit. It turned out our hotel was a 3 minute walk away so we saw quite a bit of it! I have early morning photos, shots from walking around inside, afternoon photos, sunset photos, nighttime photos. An awful lot of photos of this place!
We booked tickets online, and I highly recommend you do so as the queue for ‘reserved tickets’ is so much quicker. It actually looks a lot longer than the other queue when you first get there – quite disheartening but I’d say the other queue must have been a couple of hours long. We were in there within 20 minutes! I would advise against paying a premium for ‘skip the line’ tickets as these don’t seem to actually exist – there are two queues, one for reserved tickets, one for buying tickets.
In all honesty, if the ticket price just included the Colosseum I wouldn’t say it was hugely worth it unless you have a specific interest in Roman ruins. It’s a stunning bit of architecture, don’t get me wrong, but I think you can get that impression without heading inside. We did enjoy exploring though, and some bits were very interesting – for instance the pretty modern lift system used fr hoisting the ‘wild beasts’ into the arena.
If you do go and visit, though, do one thing for me? Don’t take a selfie stick! They drove me mad on this holiday as so many people spent their time with their backs to the scenery taking selfies. And don’t get me started on the street sellers who have clearly cottoned onto this…
Photos really don’t show the true scale of the Colosseum – it’s absolutely huge, and a really stunning bit of history. It looks especially wonderful approaching sunset, and I’m so grateful to have caught this on our final evening in Rome.
Now for photo’s not including the Colosseum! I’m willing to bet there are hundreds of tourists every day who visit the Colosseum and have no clue that their ticket also give entry to another site only 200 yards away. A site which, in my opinion, is far more interesting too!
The Forum & Palatine Hill is a pretty massive site, filled with various ruins and some pretty intact structures.
There are viewing platforms offering stunning views over Rome, shady gardens to wander through, and it’s pretty easy to accidentally tag along to a guided tour too!
There’s also a pretty interesting museum included in the ticket price, filled with various artefacts that have been dug up. The sign posts dotted around are short, fact-filled and quite amusing – I was pretty impressed at the Roman toilet structure!
Have you ever been to Rome? What was your favorite site?