Rome · Backpacking
ON A BUDGET
Rome's best sights — the fountains, the streets, half its churches — still cost nothing at all.
Monti and San Lorenzo
Hostels ring Termini station: functional, cheap and dull. Monti next door is nicer for similar money, and San Lorenzo is where students drink.
What a day costs
Dorm €22–40, pizza al taglio and a trattoria plate €15–25, a hundred-minute transit ticket €1.50. Around €50–85 a day, roughly $55–95.
Getting around cheap
A BIT ticket costs €1.50 for a hundred minutes and the 24-hour version about €7. Buses 40 and 64 run Termini to the Vatican, pickpockets included.
Free by day
The Trevi Fountain, the Spanish Steps, Trastevere and St Peter's Basilica cost nothing, and state museums open free one Sunday a month.
Piazza Trilussa
The steps in Trastevere where everyone sits with supermarket wine until late; Campo de' Fiori does the same job an hour earlier.