Colosseum Arena Floor, Roman Forum og Palatine Hill Tour

This is an excellent introductory tour to Ancient Rome. Our guide was very good, providing a great historical context for the ruins we were walking through. The highlight was certainly walking out on the Arena Floor in the Colosseum. The arrival location and assignment to our tour group and guide was disorganized at best. There are a lot of people milling around and it took a minute to make sure we were with the correct group. Once we were on our way, though, it was fine. The earpiece radios made sure that everyone in the group could hear our guide. The pace of the tour is pretty quick and doesn't leave much time to linger or study the details of any location. The new rules prevented our guide from joining us inside the Colosseum, so make sure you do not go upstairs until your have been to the Arena Floor. If you go upstairs, you will not be able to return to the floor. The view from the floor was well worth it. Overall, a good tour and nice experience.

The tour did cover all areas indicated and had a clear meeting place with shade. It did seem a bit unorganized though and our tour guide was late. She was also a bit repetitive and not as thorough as I would have liked. I did like that she had visuals of what the areas would have looked like at the time. That was the best part.

This company can no longer do tours in the Colosseum while all other companies can. They do half of a tour and then leave you outside the Colosseum to figure it out and still charge you almost the same, they discounted what I paid by 20% even though I missed half of a guided tour with my family. Do not book.

Avoid, avoid the organization "Show Me Italy". We signed up months ago for a guided tour of Palatine Hill, Roman Forum & Colosseum. Less than 48 hours before the tour we received this vial email: due to "a recent operational change introduced by the Colosseum administration...guides are unfortunately currently not permitted to accompany groups inside the Colosseum itself. " Some in our group never even got the memo. When we entered the Colosseum (on our own-no guide) there were tons of groups with guides. Made me wonder if Show Me Italy was banned. The timing, of course, didn’t give us opportunity to find a different guide (and we assumed there actually was "a recent operational change"). Tours of Italy offered a 20% refund (which Viator will give you just for referral). I complained to Viator and they upped it to 30%. This was a once in a lifetime opportunity for us & our grandson, significantly diminished by this organization. I'm sure you can absolutely find a better tour guide. To top it off, our grandson who is a 16 yr old history buff, identified (to us) several errors by our guide. At least get your facts straight if you're a guide.

1/2 of the tour (the guided Colosseum and Arena floor guided portion) were cancelled days before the excursion was planned to happen leaving us unable to find a replacement tour. We still had a tour of the Roman Forum with a guide, but were told the tour inside the colosseum could not happen because of Colosseum rules, but we saw many other groups inside with guides. A 20% discount was offered even though 1/2 the tour was gone. The meet up point was not easily marked-I had to ask multiple other tour guides where to meet (up a set of stairs and around a corner-no signs or anything to show where to go). Upon arrival my printed ticket was missing and I was told at first that I would have to go with another group. I was the one that booked the tour and said I was staying with my family, so a ticket was sent to me via What’sapp. The tour of the Roman Forum was fine and informative. We went into the Colosseum on our own and when I went to go to the arena floor, the ticket the tour group sent me did not work so only my son and husband had valid tickets. Overall very disappointed in the cancellation with no explanation and how we were handled when we found the company. We have traveled to many places internationally, and this was the worst experience we have ever had. I have been to the Colosseum many years ago, and was looking forward to having a tour guide with us.

This was a guided tour of the forum. Not the coliseum as expected. The forum tour was informative. We were told that we had a skip the line entry to the coliseum but no guided tour. Great being there. The coliseum but disappointing we did not have the tour we expected as the majority of the time was spent at the Forum only leaving time for a quick overview of the coliseum from outside then we were left to explore on our own.

Our tour guide was great. Knowledgeable. Impeccable English. Answered questions. The challenges weren't with him. First off, what I learned, do not go to Rome in the summer. Between the heat, the sun and the insane amount of tourists, this turns any experience into torture one level below waterboarding. First of all, the waits. Again not the tour guide's fault. There are hordes of tourists figuring out where to go. Once you figure out what group you are in and have your stickers on, then you wait again for the tour guide. Then once your group gets called, your tour guide takes you, to go wait in line to get in. This time the wait was 30 minutes in direct beating sunlight. No shade. By the time you get in all you want is for it to end. Not life. Just the tour. The sights are great and you have to throw elbows and push the other sweaty, sticky nasty tourists out of the way just to get a picture before you then get pushed out of the way. And that's how it goes for two hours. The Colosseum is a gem but you don't see much because there are too many people. The Forum is amazing. It's all worth it. Just do it in April or October.

The tour time was changed the day before which left us scrambling with transportation plans. The guide was nice but informed us that he could not go inside the Colesium because of some new rule. This was terrible because we had not information as we walked around. I later did see na email that said we would be getting 20% back because of this. I have not been able to get a response from Show me Italy or Viatour- I have reached out with emails and phone calls . Still nothing. I also did notice that there were other tour guides giving tours?? If you have any suggestions that would be great.

Juan Carlos (JC) was a great guide!! My family had a wonderful time! He found shade when he could, brought paper fans for people without one, and warned you ahead of time if there was no shade and when things would be hot. I wish there was more warning on the reservation about the hiking. If you don’t do well in the heat, I would skip the walking tour and just buy yourself entry tickets to the Colosseum. It was HOT. Everything was so cool, so much history. JC was great at explaining and knew SO much about the grounds. Very great afternoon.

The tour was okay, not great. The tour guide was hard to understand and didn’t really explain in depth the background of the areas we visited. The best part was touring the colosseum on our own.