San Clemente - Rome

Accommodates 6+3 — 3+ Bedrooms — 3 Baths — Terrace

One of the most interesting short-term vacation apartment rentals we have in Rome, San Clemente enjoys a charming and convenient location about halfway between the Colosseum and the basilica of San Giovanni in Laterano. Buses and subway are right there, but who needs them? In addition to the Colosseum itself, which is within sight, you can walk in under 10 minutes to a whole host of Rome’s five-star attractions like the Roman Forum, the Arch of Constantine, Nero’s Golden House, Michelangelo’s Moses, and the Aventine, Oppian, and Celian hills. The Campo dei Fiori, Pantheon, Piazza Navona and Spanish Steps are 20-40 minutes’ walk or a short bus ride.

One of Rome’s most charming new features is a minisystem of little electric buses which ply the streets of the historic center. From practically in front of the San Clemente flat, one of these will take you to past San Giovanni, Villa Celimontana, and the Colosseum through the lively (and newly trendy) Monti district, past the Trevi Fountain and Spanish Steps all the way to Piazza del Popolo.

Right around San Clemente, streets like Via Celimontana and Via Capo d’Africa light up at night with a particularly lively restaurant, pub, wine bar, and caffé scene. Recent visitors likened it to Greenwich Village in atmosphere. In summertime, excellent evening jazz concerts are held within walking distance in the Villa Celimontana, one of Rome’s most delightful parks. Speaking of parks, one of Rome’s prettiest is a very short walk away, the park of the Domus Aurea where you can have your coffee and read your newspaper at an open-air caffé run by the same Roman woman for the past 42 years. Otherwise in the daytime, you’ll find our San Clemente flat to be at the heart of a real Roman neighborhood with little English spoken for maximum authenticity. All neighborhood services are at hand: grocers, open-air fruit/vegetable stand, butchers, pastry shops, banks, post office, coffee bars, household supply shops, tobacconists, beauticians, and barbers.

To reach this sophisticated Roman flat, you walk up about 30 steps to a high second floor. This comfortable fully air-conditioned holiday home consists of an entry hall, living/dining room, and matrimonial bedroom with bath en-suite. The kitchen comes equipped with a full-size fridge, stovetop and oven, microwave, and clothes washer (no dishwasher). On the opposite side of the flat you’ll find a second, quite unusual bedroom suite, with a kind of study/den downstairs, off of which is this suite’s bathroom; up a flight of stairs, you find yourself just below the delightful brick barrel-vaulted ceiling in a balconied bedroom area with a divisible matrimonial bed, plus two additional single beds.

Another door in the kitchen leads out to a charming terrace with table and chairs seating 6 comfortably. Across the terrace is the flat’s third bedroom with en-suite bath. All the bedrooms and the living room have TV; all the bathrooms have American-style shower stalls, no bathtubs.

One of the San Clemente flat’s biggest pluses, especially for couples traveling together, is the fact that the three bedrooms are quite separate and independent, allowing for maximum privacy. The quality and size of the bedrooms are approximately equal, an unusual quality in a vacation apartment in Rome.

The owners of the San Clemente flat are particularly welcoming. They have lived in the neighborhood all their lives and know everything about it. Through a local cantina, they get good deals on wine which they’re willing to pass on to you, with similar arrangements possible for products from the Umbrian town Norcia, famous for sausages, prosciutto, lentils, and, in fall, truffles. The owner’s wife is willing, with advance notice, to prepare home-made tarts and other sweets, and even, perhaps, a real Roman home-cooked meal.