At the end of our week in Sarzana, it was time for Jeremy and I to continue our travels, while my parents headed back to Paris and London and eventually back home. Jeremy and I decided to visit Rome, since neither of us had ever been. We chose to spend the night in Pisa, to break up the train journey. For some reason we were exhausted by the time we got to Pisa, so we just walked around town and to the tower, then made it an early night to get some rest.

 

 

Pigneto Neighborhood in Rome

One of my favorite things about staying in Airbnbs is that you get to temporarily live in a neighborhood you may not have even visited otherwise. A lot of the places that we stay don’t even have hotels nearby, and we get to feel what it would be like to live in that city, away from the main tourist attractions. In big cities, staying in the center is also just too expensive, for the most part. This was especially true in Rome; the affordable options were pretty limited, and since neither of us had ever been, it was hard to know what the best  location would be. We also only rent places with wifi so we can work remotely, and I wanted an apartment with an air conditioner… I have enough sleeping problems as it is, and being hot at night pretty much guarantees very little sleep for me. I saw the Airbnb Neighborhood Guide for Pigneto, and found a reasonably priced apartment with A/C in walking distance of the pedestrian strip that looked interesting. It turned out to be a great decision, and we spent most of our time in Pigneto, trying different restaurants and bars and visiting the farmers market that happens every day. It reminded us of the Alberta Arts District in Portland, if anyone’s ever been. All of the bars on the main street would show the World Cup matches also, and people would crowd in the street to watch.

As travelers that try not to spend too much money on going out to eat and instead cook at our accommodations (which we failed at in Italy), we had done our research on good aperitivo places since it was supposed to be pretty cheap. Aperitivo is similar to happy hour, although it happens later than in America (around 7pm), since people in Italy eat dinner at like 10pm. Some bars/restaurants will offer a buffet that you can visit with the price of a drink, or you can order off an aperitivo menu, which is always priced really well. Some just bring food to your table after you order a drink. This was basically a dream come true for us. It was a light dinner that we could eat early, and not drain our wallets. And all the food was crazy delicious. It’s actually hard for me to post these pictures because it makes me want them again so badly. Here are some of our favorites:

I hope everyone is sufficiently hungry now!