Address: Piazza Navona, 00186 Roma
Piazza Navona is one of Rome’s most famous square. Built on the site where it use to be a stadium in the 1th century A.D. The elongated shape has to do with that it use to hold up to 20 000 spectators for the athletic competitions held on the stadium. Nowadays the square is filled with cafés, and and restaurants. During Christmas time the square is transformed in to a big outside Christmas market.
We came in the morning and it´s impressive the size. The kids were amazed that it use to be a place of sport and horse races. They had a hard time to imagine how many people could be in one place. After a while they started a running competition and yelling “watch out here comes the Romans”.
Sant’Agnese in Agone
A palace in the Piazza Navona that was built as a church. Nowadays the church is still in use and holds services regularly, but also big events, and you can visit the crypt as well if that is of interest.
https://www.santagneseinagone.org/en
The fountains
The square has 3 fountains: Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, Fontana del Moro and Fontana del Nettuno. All of them have different style and many small details. We made it in to a game with the kids to try to find as many differences between them as possible.
How to get here by metro
It’s a 20 minutes walk from the nearest metro stop, all the way over at the Spanish steps Spagna. We went first to the Spanish steps on our tour of the day. After enjoying the nice view at the Spanish steps, we took a walk over to Piazza Navona. It is a nice walk and the kids liked that they were allowed to choose which directions to take from time to time. We just strolled around in all the nice streets in the center of Rome on our way.
Below you find different maps of interest for transportation in Rome.
https://www.atac.roma.it/en/utility/maps
Hope you will enjoy the nice surroundings and piazzas on your trip!