Customer Reviews

Rick Steves' Rome 2003

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Rick Steves concentrates on seeing the sights in Rome & travel survival fundamentals. His coverage on what to see at various sites, and his focus on walking tours and seeing what is in a specific locale is excellent. We walked everywhere and wanted to see the sights - not shop. Excellent for this purpose.

He does not focus on shopping, restaurants or hotels (there is limited coverage). He has clear opinions. He gives the facts, but also his opinion of the place and his specific recommendations. If you want book with lots of shopping and restuarant info, or just want an "opinion free" description buy something else.

If you have a week or less, are willing to use your feet, are interested in walking tours, or are focusing on seeing a lot of what Rome has to offer with limited time - the book is for you. We read (not skimmed) 5 guidebooks. His was the best.

This guidebook is hopelessly inaccurate in its details and too cursory about what it does cover to be of any use whatsoever to any reasonably thoughtful tourist.

As to the inaccuracy: I took this guide book on a recent trip to Rome. Despite the fact that it is dated 2004, it is either wildly outdated or reprehensibly sloppy. One of the highly recommended restaurants was closed, and from the looks of it not recently. Another of the highly recommended restaurants was responsible for the worst dinner we had in Rome. Anyone foolish enough to try to use the guide to find the Steves-recommended minibus tour of the Appia Antica will look in vain for a green kiosk in the Piazza Venezia. While we eventually found a tour, it was no thanks to Rick Steves!

In terms of information content, the guidebook gives the tourist much less information for the weight than, say, the Michelin or Lonely Planet guides. Do not waste precious luggage space on the Rick Steves guide--it is simply not worth lugging around.

... and the maps are worthless.

Two examples of the many glaring inaccuracies contained in this book:

1) Rick claims you can pick up a bus map in any tourist information kiosk. The following is an actual transcript of our conversation with the tourist info lady:

us: buon giorno. do you speak english?

info lady: of course.

us: we'd like to go to Vatican city. may we have a bus map please?

info lady: a bus map? for Roma?

us: um, yes.

info lady: no such thing exists.

2) Rick claims you can see everything you want to see in the Vatican in one morning: St. Peter's Basilica, the Vatican Museums, the Sistine Chapel - everything. Um, Rick? Have you ever BEEN there? Did you notice the 40,000 other people there all trying to get in to the same things? Did you notice the priceless and beautiful works of art on practically every surface? Did it occur to you that people might, perhaps, want to stop and admire a large number of them? Light a candle? Say a prayer? Some of us, also, have to behind a crowd of 35 elderly Germans to look at Michaelangelo's Pieta, and everything else.

Methinks ol' Rick either spends an average of 15 minutes apiece on the most astonishing and pleasurable spots in Rome, or is comfortable elbowing foreign senior citizens in the ribs.

I've been to Italy several times.....Rome, Venice, Florence, Bologna, Milan, some of the hill towns, etc. Here are my reviews of the best guides to meet you r exact needs.....I hope these are helpful and that you have a great visit! I always gauge the quality of my visit by how much I remember a year later......this review is designed to help you get the guide that will be sure YOU remember your trip many years into the future. Travel Safe and enjoy yourself to the max!

Rick Steves' books are not recommended. They may be an interesting read but their helpfulness is very poor. They don't do well on updates, transportation details, or anything but the first-time-tourist routine and even that is somewhat superficial on anything but the mega-major sites.

Frommer's

These are time tested guides that pride themselves on being updated annually. Although I think the guides below provide information that is in more depth or more concise (depending on what the guide is known for), if your main concern is that the guide has very little old or outdated information, then this would be a good guide for you.

Lonely Planet

Lonely Planet has City and Out To Eat Guides. They are all about the experience so they focus on doing, being, getting there, and this means they have the best detailed information, including both inexpensive and really spectacular restaurants and hotels, out-of-the-way places, weird things to see and do, the list is endless.

Blue Guides

Without doubt, the best of the walks guides.... the Blue Guide has been around since 1918 and has extremely well designed walks with lots of unique little side stops to hit on just about any interest you have. If you want to pick up the feel of the city, this is the best book to do that for you. This is one that you end up packing on your 10th trip, by which time it is well worn.

MapGuide

MapGuide is very easy to use and has the best location information for hotels, tourist attractions, museums, churches etc. that they manage to keep fairly up to date. It's great for teaching you how to use the public transportation system. The text sections are quick overviews, not reviews, but the strong suite here is brevity, not depth. I strongly recommend this for your first few times learning your way around the classic tourist sites and experiences. MapGuide is excellent as long as you are staying pretty much in the center of the city.

Time Out

The Time Out guides are very good. Easy reading, short reviews of restaurants, hotels, and other sites, with good public transport maps that go beyond the city centre. Many people who buy more than one guidebook end up liking this one best!

Let's Go

Let's Go is a great guide series that specializes in the niche interest details that turn a trip into a great and memorable experience. Started by and for college students, these guides are famous for the details provided by people who used the book the previous year. They continue to focus on providing a great experience inexpensively. If you want to know about the top restaurants, this is not for you (use Fodor's or Michelin). Let's Go does have a bewildering array of different guides though. Here's which is what:

Budget Guide is the main guide with incredibly detailed information and reviews on everything you can think of.

City Guide is just as intense but restricted to the single city.

PocketGuide is even smaller and features condensed information

MapGuide's are very good maps with public transportation and some other information (like museum hours, etc.)

Michelin

Famous for their quality reviews, the Red Michelin Guides are for hotels & Restaurants, the Green Michelin Guides are for main tourist destinations. However, the English language Green guide is the one most people use and it has now been supplemented with hotel and restaurant information. These are the serious review guides as the famous Michelin ratings are issued via these books.

Fodor's

Fodor's is the best selling guide among Americans. They have a bewildering array of different guides. Here's which is what:

The Gold Guide is the main book with good reviews of everything and lots of tours, walks, and just about everything else you could think of. It's not called the Gold guide for nothing though....it assumes you have money and are willing to spend it.

SeeIt! is a concise guide that extracts the most popular items from the Gold Guide

PocketGuide is designed for a quick first visit

UpCLOSE for independent travel that is cheap and well thought out

CityPack is a plastic pocket map with some guide information

Exploring is for cultural interests, lots of photos and designed to supplement the Gold guide

We went to Italy on our honeymoon and could not have spent our time better without this book. The tips are valuable and the descriptions are right on. The other nice surpise is that a lot of the vendors mentioned know Rick Steves well and would give better offers because of the book. We mentioned it at hotels and restaurants and got discounts. We also highly recommend Rick Steves' Mona Lisa Winks. Some of the museums do not have English descriptions at all and the audioguide rentals can add up. We would not travel to Europe without Rick Steves!

Having lived in Rome for several years as an American expat, I am constantly being asked about guide books and have read all of them. And Rick Steves is really the worst ever! It is the perfect guidebook for the single digit IQ teen on the "Do Europe" thang, but when I actually lived there after having bought this wretched tome and studied classics and art there, I realised how much of this book is just American stereotypes of a few days spent in tourist traps in the Eternal City. And Rome does not have good food? Rick, either your palate is as dumb as stone or you need to live with the Romans for a while and get nice and fat like those of us who came as skinny American kids and matured into solid young men under the Roman sun.

This book is a must read before going to Rome. All the information and recommendations were very helpful in making my visit enjoyable. Highly recommend you pay attention to the caution he makes concerning pick-pockets in the Rome Meto as a member of our group did not take the warning and paid the price. We stayed at one of the family run and small hotels he recommended, outstanding for the price. Forget the American Express Card and "Don't leave Home without"..this book.

I very much enjoyed this must read before setting foot on Roman soil. This book is riddled with all sorts of hints and tips to fully enjoy the experience of traveling to Rome.

I bought this book because I had seen (and suffered through) Steves' amateurish and infantile videos on visiting Italy. I was curious to see if his books were as bad as his videos. The verdict: they are equally as bad. The problem is, Steves isn't an innate or talented traveler, though he apparently has performed a miracle and makes money fooling others that he *is* a great traveler. The Arthur Frommer Guides are much better than these Steves offerings.

Problems abound. Steves concentrates most of his time on typical tourist destinations in Rome. Of course it's interesting to read about the Coliseum, but does he provide information on how to catch a taxi or streetcar? Of course not. What about hotels? His advice is universally bad. He hasn't a clue on how to locate a low-cost Pensions and opts for dingy tents on the outskirts of town. His suggestions on eating are obtuse. Snacking in Italy is a cinch: go to a bakery in the morning, buy your rolls, cheese and coffee and be on your way. His suggestions of hanging around railway stations and saving a few pennies are insulting and poorly rendered.

Similarly wretched is his advice on getting about the city and Rome's environs. Forget the railway, you can rent an econo car for about $150 a week. Yes, gas is expensive, but driving is the only way to see this beautiful country, though I would not recommend driving within the city limits. Another weakness is Steves' opinions of Rome, which basically consists of 10 pages advising you to frequent the cheapest and most touris-ridden spots. If that's all there is to see and do in Rome, then we're in trouble. Truly, this is a terrible book written in plodding, patronizing style, guaranteed to set your nerves a-jangle. Rome is a sublime place: the people, the food, the sights and sounds are fantastic! This book will steer you to the worst tourist traps. Avoid it.