Art & Museums, Rome

Favorite thing: I had the big luck of visiting Rome during the Week of Culture (May 5th to May 12th) in which all museums and monuments in Italy have free entrance. Not only this means huge savings but you can also visit many secondary places that normally would be left aside because they may not worth the money for just a quick visit. I was afraid to face long lines but it didn't happen at all. If you plan a visit next year try to catch this week which also overlapped with the Rome Tennis Open.

Favorite thing: Stroll around all the city and buy a good guide. Get lost inside that madness of Roman rests, fountains, churches and squares. There are thousand of little churches (look the travelogues) and you can find lots of treasures inside almost by chance.
This Caravaggio's painting in the left is a good example, in San Luigi dei Francesi. Other ones could be Sta. Maria dela Vittoria (Bernini's Sta. Teresa) or San Pietro in Vincoli (Michelangelo's Moises).
That's it... use your feet!

Fondest memory: There is an amazing great surprise in every corner !

Favorite thing: Although we didn't go in this museum - we just enjoyed the park around it - it is well recommended. Make plenty of time for it there seemed to be quite a queue to get in as there are timed admissions.
Staues and paintings a plenty to found within

Favorite thing: Highly decorated and far removed from the pine box and even now we are considering some bio-degradable type of home for bones.

It must have taken them just ages to decorate these and it never ceases to amaze me that in some instances it can be 2000 years after the event and the packaging survives.

Fondest memory: This one in the grounds at the front of the National Museum in Rome.

Favorite thing: MUSEUM OF ROMAN CIVILIZATION
P.zza Agnelli, 10 - tel. 5926135 / Opening hours: 9a.m.-7p.m.; sun. and holidays 9a.m.-1p.m.; closed Monday / Entrance L. 5.000. Free: less than 18 and over 60 years old.
An impressive ammount of reproductions testifie the Roman civilization in all its aspects, room XXXVII contains the famous model of impreial Rome (see Photo) on the scale of 1:250 a work by the architect Italo Gismondi.
PIAZZA G. AGNELLI, 10 - ROMA - 54B3 / Tel.: 5926135-5926041 / TIMETABLE AND TICKETS: TICKET L.5.000. H.9-19/ 9AM.-7 P.M. /DOM. E FESTIVI 9-14/SUN. AND HOL. 9 A.M. 2 PM. MOND. CLOSED.

Favorite thing: MUSEO CAPITOLINO
The Capitoline Museum was built in the 17th century based on an architectural sketch by Michelangelo. In the first room is The Dying Gaul, a work of majestic skill that's a copy of a Greek original dating from the 3rd century B.C. In a special gallery all her own is the Capitoline Venus, who demurely covers herself. This statue was the symbol of feminine beauty and charm down through the centuries (also a Roman copy of a 3rd-century B.C. Greek original). Amore (Cupid) and Psyche are up to their old tricks near the window.
The entrance courtyard (see photo at left) is lined with the remains (head, hands, foot, and a kneecap) of an ancient colossal statue of Constantine the Great.
Piazza del Campidoglio / Phone: 06/67102071 / Open: Tues-Sun 9am-7pm. Bus: 44, 89, 92, 94, or 716. Admission (to both) 10,000L adults, 5,000L children under age 18. Free on last Sun of each month.

Favorite thing: Visit the Palazzo dei Conservatori. It was the seat of the city's magistrates during the late middle ages. There are many great works of art there including the 'She Wolf' with Romulus and Remus,'Spinario'(bronze sculpture from the first century AD of a boy trying to remove a thorn from his foot),'St. John the Baptist'(painted in 1595 by Caravaggio) and 'Esquiline Venus'
My favorite was the 'Head of Constantine II' The remains of a colossal 4th AD statue.

Favorite thing: thank you!

But wasn't it possible to reseve by e-mail? that's really weird...

I'm affraid that if I don't reserve it now for saturday it will be difficult... and I have no chance to call...

katy