My daughter and I had such a lovely month's stay in Antonella's apartment! When I knew I would be headed to Rome for a month with my adult disabled daughter, I really wanted to find a place where we would both feel safe and comfortable. I read every single review of this place and the comments were glowing about how nice the owners were. I knew I had to stay here. And after living at La Rosa Di Roma for a month, I can confidently say that the rave reviews were spot on! After a long flight, we were greeted by the owners' son, Andrea. He showed me all around the apartment and left us milk, juice and other treats for our arrival. From that day forward, he and his dad, Mauro, were completely committed to helping me in any way that they could, from bringing me more towels to helping me figure out the bus to restocking the paper products in the apartment. They were at my disposal at all times with their one wish being that my daughter and I were happy. We felt truly taken care of.
The apartment itself was spotlessly clean and very cozy. The neighborhood is extremely safe and my daughter and I felt very at home. It was sweltering in early September in Rome so the air conditioning was a must and it worked beautifully. The bedrooms have awesome storage space with each bedroom having a large wardrobe with shelves and drawers and hanging space. The bathrooms were lovely and the water pressure was great-I wish I had that pressure at home! A note to my American friends - this is a very European apartment. The showers are excellent, but not huge. The washer/dryer is a combo unit and only holds a small amount of clothes. The time it takes to wash and dry the clothes is about 5 hours. No "speed wash" here! After doing one wash/dry, I decided just to wash my clothes (1hr and it does a fantastic job of cleaning them) and then dry them on the drying racks in the apartment. This worked great and we ended up doing lots of washes because we were there for some of the hottest weeks of the summer. The kitchen is compact, but very functional with a dishwasher and an American coffee pot which was very appreciated. I don't think they have coffee "to go" in many places in Rome, so I made my coffee everyday.
The location is in a quaint, residential roman neighborhood. There is a nice pastry shop about a minute walk away-Caffe 104. There are also some cute wine bars, local restaurants, pizza by the slice and a great gelateria about a 3 minute walk away in Piazza Ottavilla. There is also a fantastic grocery store, DOC, 2 minutes away from the apartment. I shopped there often and it had such high quality produce, wines and cheeses that were so much less expensive than in the U.S.
The apartment is a nice 25 minute walk away from the livelier Trastevere with its many restaurants, shops and cafes and the main sites like the Forum, Coliseum, Pantheon are farther, across the Tiber river. My daughter is not a huge fan of walking, so this made getting to the more 'touristy" areas problematic at times. There are buses, but they don't really seem to run on a schedule and there are taxis. If you like a quieter location and like walking and taking cabs, this apartment really can't be beat. Had I been with my girlfriends, getting around would have been easy, but I mention this if you've got people with mobility issues in your group.
To sum it up, we spent 4 glorious weeks at this airbnb and I'm so glad we did. It really felt like our home and after a long day exploring all Rome has to offer, we loved coming back to this sanctuary. The owners really went out of their way to make us feel welcome and I felt secure knowing that if I ran into a problem, Andrea and Mauro would be right there helping me solve it. The peace of mind I had while there was priceless and it was because of this warm, caring family. I can recommend without hesitation La Rosa Di Roma and if you book it, you too will have the pleasure of staying in a lovely apartment and meeting these wonderful people.