Civitavecchia, Rome

 16/11/2025

Another mild day is ahead of us as we dock at Civitavecchia, the Port of Rome. It is quite a distance to the city of Rome from here, so day tours start early and run for about 8 hours. Our tour leaves at 8 .20 am, and is one of many, Fortunately, there do not appear to be a lot of cruise boats in port when we arrive.

The bus trip to the city takes around 1 hour, and once there we have about 1.5 hours of sightseeing in the bus before disembarking in the middle of the City for 4 hours of free time. 

Our tour bus tour takes us past a few of the outer lying attractions including the Colosseum, old city walls etc, much of which was not able to be photographed from a moving bus, especially if the attraction was on the other side of the bus.


Baths of Caracalla

Fortunately we did get a clear shot of Circus Maximus, still the largest stadium in the World, capable of accomodating 250,000 people. Sadly there are no chariot races, gladiatorial games or public executions in modern times to take advantage of this capacity, but it is quite remarkable that it was built in the 6th Century BC.

Today it is used as a large public park and venue for concerts, cultural events etc.


Circus Maximus


Remains of Imperial palaces overlooking Circus Maximus


Temple of Hercules Victor (the oldest preserved marble building in Rome)

We continue on in the bus past many old buildings of significance to eventually reach our drop off point in the city for our free time. There are a number of attractions within walking distance of this spot which is on the River Tiber, within a reasonable walk of the Vatican.


Looking down the Tiber to St Peters Basilica (from the Umberto Bridge)

Our guide take us to the nearest public square Piazza Navona for a final briefing and directions on how to get to the Pantheon, Spanish Steps and Trevi Fountain before letting us loose for our free time. It is not recommended we go to the Vatican today as there is a major event going on there to celebrate the Jubilee of the Poor and crowds are expected to be huge as, the Pope will be conducting a special service.


Piazza Navona


It is already pretty clear that the crowds are going to be a problem getting around and getting access to some of the attractions. Our first stop is the Pantheon, and on arrival there the square is packed, with hundreds of people queued up to get a look inside. As we have been there before when access was no problem, the tough of queuing up for an hour or more simply to look inside had little attraction, so we moved on.




Pantheon

Next nearest attraction is the Trevi Fountain. After observing the crowds at the Pantheon we can only imagine what it is going to be like at the Trevi Fountain.


This was the closest we could get to the fountain

It's time for lunch. Who cares about the Spanish Steps, we just want to find somewhere away from the crowds where we can sit and enjoy a nice lunch and a cold drink. We found a nice cafe in an alleyway well away from the crowds and relaxed there for a while and had lunch.

Now focused on avoiding the crowds we wandered back in the direction of Piazza Navona through lots of narrow cobblestone streets. Once back there , it was time for a cup of coffee, so we found a nice little cafe a few streets back from the square and had a seat and a cup of coffee there, only to be advised by the cafe owner, that their outside seating in an alleyway was not for coffee drinkers, you had to do that inside the cafe. We ignored him, finished our coffee and moved on.

Next priority is to find somewhere where we can sit and wait patiently fo the bus. Public seating was obviously not a focus in Ancient Rome, a legacy the current administration has stuck with. Just across the river from our pick up point is the newly renovated Supreme Court Building, the Palace of Justice




Palace of Justice

Eventually our bus arrives, everyone had been lingering around waiting for its arrival, so we were soon all on board and on our way back to the ship. By the time we were back on board it was 4.30pm, so it has been a long shore excursion.

Tonight we depart late at around 9.30 pm, with tomorrow being an at sea day on our way to Malta. We look forward to a restful day after three consecutive port visits. The weather continues to be very good to us with temperatures a bit warmer than we expected, low  20's most days.
















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