My friend Greta Caruso is a Rome veteran who has spent several cumulative years living in Rome over the past couple of decades, but her last stint was different. This time she had two tiny humans along for the ride, giving this food-fixated writer and cook a totally new perspective on the Italian capital. She […]

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My friend is a Rome veteran who has spent several cumulative years living in Rome over the past couple of decades, but her last stint was different. This time she had two tiny humans along for the ride, giving this food-fixated writer and cook a totally new perspective on the Italian capital. She shares her two centesimi below. Be sure to keep up with Greta Caruso on her Substack , and pick up her The New York Times Bestselling children’s book, , co-authored with Jake Gyllenhaal!

A few suggestions for navigating Rome with little kids in tow

If you are like me—a person with small children who loves to travel and is constitutionally unable to sacrifice even a morsel of food to the shitty tourist food gods—then I have good news for you: Rome is a great place to go. No, this will not be a trip during which you see all the sights and eat at all the restaurants, but if you give in to the constraints of having little kids in tow, you can still have a wonderful—and delicious—visit.

I had the great good fortune to spend the first half of 2025 in Rome with my two young daughters who were just under 3 and just under 1 by the time we left. While it was a comically different lifestyle from when I was living in Rome as an unencumbered 24 year old, we still managed to learn the city while making it fun for the girls—and without having to spend all of our weekends at the Italian equivalent of Chuck-E-Cheese (Carlo E Formaggio?).

For kids a bit older than mine, Katie wrote , but if your kids are stroller-bound, stroller-dependent or simply completely unwilling to hang on a multi-hour tour of the Vatican museum, this guide is for you. A note: we were living here and not vacationing, which means we wanted to keep our nap and bedtime routine relatively intact. Because my kids nap midday and go to sleep around 7:30, and most (good) restaurants in Rome open for lunch at 12:45/1 and for dinner at 7:30, this is…not great for restaurant eating with the whole family. That said, if you’re in vacation mode and happy to blow through your normal routines, you’ll be glad to know that Romans are pretty hospitable to kids in restaurants—and everywhere, really. (Just don’t be monsters; try to keep your stroller footprint modest.) For us, though, we found that if lunch was a picnic in a playground or park, the kids were well-fed and tuckered out enough that we could peacefully check out some nearby ruins or churches. For dinners, we generally cooked at home with incredible ingredients from the region, or wrangled the kids at enotecas with good food that open early for aperitivo hour at 5 or 6. And for the other nights, we got a babysitter and hit the town.

The gated is fantastic: lots of swings, slides and old balance bikes and kiddy Vespas for everyone to use. (Note: this playground is closed for renovations during the summer of 2025!) Get to-go sandwiches and suppli at nearby , or head to the wonderful Mercato Testaccio where you can grab meaty Roman sandwiches at , pizza at or incredible beans and soups at : a small counter serving Tuscan food made by my favorite cook in Rome, Leo Cioni. (There’s also a right next to the mercato.) For sweet treats, the gelato at around the corner is so very good.

A few blocks away is the great Piazza Testaccio, a perfect example of neighborhood piazza culture—in the afternoons it’s packed with post-school kids bombing around on their scooters or playing soccer, while parents and grandparents sit on benches with a glass of wine or spritz from the outdoor cart run by the bar .

Close by, where Testaccio meets Ostiense, Aventino and San Saba, you’ll find really good coffee and wine at in the corner of Parco della Resistenza dell’otto Settembre. The park itself is a bit of dog-poop central but there is a in the corner that will occupy your kids for long enough for you to enjoy your to-go coffee.

Further down Viale Aventino, get yourself some fantastic, not-too-sweet gelato at and pizza by the slice at (two more Parla recs) before heading up the Aventine Hill to the truly spectacular , where your kids can run and climb trees while you admire the Roman skyline and listen to buskers play authentic Italian music such as Coldplay’s “Fix You.” If time allows, peek your head into —the oldest basilica in Rome and home to the Dominican order—and go around the corner to buy some fragrant monk-or-nun-made herbal soaps and lotions at the (think Santa Maria Novella without the marketing and global expansion).

The Circus Maximus is both a 2,500-year-old ruin of a stadium and a wide open field in which young people can run around freely—a win-win for the whole family. (Though skip the Circo during the summer: it’s set up for concerts in June, July and August.) Grab pizza and beer to go at and park yourselves at the circus for a picnic and a run around. If you’re there on the weekend, head into the , to stock your Airbnb kitchen with produce, meats and cheeses from wonderful local purveyors. (The earlier you go the better.) 

If you’re still in need of a ruin-run around double header, walk 10 minutes to the (stroller accessible) Terme di Caracalla. Parents can admire the incredible mosaics while kids safely roam free range. There are chairs to pull into the shade if anyone is in need of snack time or a seat on which to have a meltdown. 

There is a —home to Nero’s truly demented with a killer view of the Colosseum. (No one is asking me, but I’ll share my Colosseum advice: skip it. The crowds and lines are awful and unpleasant and you see quite a bit of the amphitheater just by strolling past.) After your kids run around at the playground—while you gaze at Trajan’s nearby baths—head into Monti and pay your respects to Papa Francesco at or check out , stopping at when the youngest (or oldest) members of your party have hit their Basilica limit.

has good coffee and nice pastries, pizza and savory torte if you need some snacks for your stroll. You can also eat there but there’s often a line (of tourists) for tables. Nearby serves up plates of delicious Indian food for those suffering from pasta fatigue.

The zone closest to Piazza Santa Maria in Trastevere tends to be ludicrously crowded, but a few blocks away, is a nice quasi-reprieve from the fray. There’s a that has some excellent stuff, but tends to have Big Kid Energy, so it’s best to stay vigilant if you’re there with little ones. Grab gelato at and browse the  insanely cute kids clothes at , or hit the two toy stores that are a stone’s throw from the piazza: and . Nearby restaurant has solid pizza and is open continuously from noon until midnight—my daughter once took a 45 minute stroller nap while we had lunch here, so that’s really saying something.

I’m happy to say that Rome is home to , so if you run into weather that is either too wet or too hot to bear—or you just need a morning off from touristing—your time will be well-spent here. There are tons of great stations inside, and a playground with a zipline outside, too. For food, you can grab a not-Roman-but-pretty-good brunch or lunch at next door before walking a few blocks with your kids who are tired enough to let you admire the gobsmacking Caravaggios at . It’s wise to reserve your museum tickets ahead of time (the night before was always fine for me) since the entries are timed.

While undeniably beautiful, the Centro Storico is not—in my experience—particularly fun while traveling with little kids. It’s all gorgeous, narrow cobblestone streets which are, unfortunately, pretty unpleasant with strollers—especially when it’s packed during the high season. Thus, I recommend surgical strikes into the centro—get in and get out—and wait until your kids are old enough to be on their feet for a while to spend a full day wandering around there.

That said, I’ll offer an honorable mention to : a kids clothes shop close to the Campo dei Fiori in which everything is yes, made by hand by Rachele. She has great, colorful stuff and it’s the kind of souvenir that you truly can’t get anywhere else.

Ditto for , a nearby tailor that has been making the pope’s socks since the 18th century—and they make baby socks to match His Holiness’s.

The Villa Borghese gets a lot of tourist love, which is fair considering those Berninis and Caravaggios at the gallery, but the park itself can get unpleasantly packed with Instagram tourists in the high season. Instead, I recommend a visit to the Villa Pamphili, which was once the private villa and grounds of the “noble” Dora Pamphili family and is now Rome’s largest park. The grounds (and people watching) are gorgeous and expansive. To make your visit manageable for everyone involved, I recommend (the food is neither amazing nor terrible) the night before your visit and take a cab to the park entrance closest to the cafe—use the address Via Vitellia, 100 as your destination. The cafe is right next to a great playground so your family can enjoy lunch, the playground and the spectacular grounds at the same time. After, encourage a stroller nap as you take the 1.5 mile walk to the main park entrance which spits you out into the Monteverde neighborhood on the Janiculum Hill. There’s 10 minutes from there if anyone needs a treat.

As mentioned, it’s best to keep your strollers as low profile and sturdy as possible. Doors, elevators and streets are narrow, but those cobblestones will destroy a travel stroller that’s too dainty, so choose wisely. (We used a Yoyo and a Doona, which were both fine.)

For kids that have outgrown the Doona, I like the which you can use in lieu of a car seat for kids from the ages of 2-4 ish. Obviously it’s not as safe as a car seat, but they’re fine for short cab rides and they’re light enough to be stuffed into a backpack—essential for those days when you’re out and about and need to get home quickly.

For all of those playground, piazza and park hangs, bring something that can double as a picnic blanket. We always travel with a few of —they’re light, they’re soft and they serve a million purposes (sun shade, puke-fest clean-up cloth, you name it)

Definitely have a water bottle on hand—Roman water is delicious (remember those ancient aqueducts?) and flowing freely from the 2500 that are scattered around the city. out of.

Otherwise, if you forgot some essential piece of kids gear, is a great kids store in Testaccio.

I could not recommend more highly. He is a wonderful pediatrician that does home visits and speaks great English. Contact him via WhatsApp message +393405561810 

Speaking of emergencies, if you have to take your kid to the Emergency Room (pronto soccorso in Italian), take them to . (Note: there are two Bambino Gesu locations, but the ER is at the location near the Vatican at Piazza di Sant’Onofrio, 4) And FYI, the Italian equivalent of 911 is 112.

For all kid-health-related things that don’t require a doctor or hospital, I encourage you to lean heavily on the expertise of pharmacists. I have gone into Roman pharmacies with any number of adult or kid ailment to address and they have guided me to the right treatment every single time.

Baby formula is generally sold at pharmacies—I noticed HiPP was the most readily available—but carries a few of the big European brands (Aptamil, BBmilk, Formulat, Holle, Humana, Mellin)  and there are a number of Farmacia Igea locations throughout the city. Otherwise, you can order European formula from and it’ll be delivered via DHL in two days. 

For diapers and the rest, supermarkets and pharmacies will have you covered. 
I love to make purees for my daughter to eat, but it can be next to impossible when you’re traveling. Ready-made baby food pouches by are tasty and made with organic fruit (and nothing else). Find those at any of the multiple locations of NaturaSi, a popular health food store that also sells jars of prosciutto puree for babies which is also maybe a great souvenir?

Thanks for tagging along on our Roman adventure. Traveling with little kids is always chaotic, often hilarious, and occasionally deeply moving—and Rome, with all its beauty, grit, and gelato, met us exactly where we were. I hope these tips help you savor the good stuff and sidestep a meltdown or two. Buon viaggio!

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