Costs nothing
Some of the best things within an hour of Rome have no ticket office. Hot sulphur water in the open, abbeys that have been free for a thousand years, and a lot of coastline.
24 days out17 placesthe nearest is in Rome itself
Nothing on this page costs anything to do. That is a fact taken from the operator, not an estimate: where a card says free, the operator publishes that it is free, and where we do not know the price, the card says that instead and does not appear here.
You will still spend money on the day — getting there, and lunch, and neither is nothing. But the thing itself is open and free, which changes the shape of a day out considerably.
The free half of this catalogue is mostly the oldest half. A hilltop village you walk into and around, an abbey that has never charged, a Roman gate or a stretch of aqueduct standing in a field, a piece of coast with nothing built on it, and sulphur water coming out of the ground into a rock pool. Nobody sells these, which is exactly why they are missing from every other page you will read about the country around Rome.
That also means nobody is expecting you, and there is no desk to ask. Take a towel and something on your feet for the hot springs. Check a church door before you drive to it, because a church is free to go into and still has opening hours. And take cash for the car park, which is the one thing on a free day that reliably is not.
It is also the kind of day that most wants a car, because a place nobody sells is a place nobody has put a bus stop outside. With the ticket costing nothing, that is usually an easy trade.
Sorted by how close it is to Rome. Villages, abbeys, aqueducts, city gates, gorges and open coast: everything here is a place rather than a product, which is why there is nothing to book and nothing to pay.
Closest to Rome first. Never by who pays us.
In the airA tandem skydive from over 4,000 metres with about sixty seconds of free fall, preceded by ground training on the phases of the jump, the position to hold in free fall and canop…
See the day
On the trailA free full-day guided trek organised by the Monti Lucretili regional park, starting from San Polo dei Cavalieri and heading up to the Pratone, the high meadow below Monte Gennaro.
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On the trailSix-hour guided walk in the Treja gorge to the archaeological remains of ancient Narce, entering a chamber tomb with its sarcophagi, with views over Monte Soratte, and ending in…
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With your handsAn organic Cesanese producer on the Terre del Cesanese road at Olevano Romano, at about 350 m above sea level.
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On the trailFree evening observation sessions at the Claudio del Sole astronomical observatory at Prataglia, above Cervara di Roma, run by an astronomy association.
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On the trailTwo-hour guided reading of the sixteenth-century Sacro Bosco: the sculptures carved out of the living peperino rock are treated as the stages of an initiatory route, from the Th…
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On horsebackA walk through the chestnut woods in the company of donkeys that live free in the forest, with a visit to the rock hermitage of San Leonardo and a tasting of organic jams.
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In the airA tandem flight under a powered paraglider, listed by ASD Aero Club Union alongside its free-flight tandems.
A sports club — you join them for the day
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In the hot water58°C out of the ground, free, 209 metres from the bus stop, and no changing room.
Free — nothing to pay
Booked by phone
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In the hot waterA hyperthermal spring two and a half kilometres out of Viterbo, feeding two open-air pools that nobody owns and nobody charges for.
Free — nothing to pay
Just turn up — open air, any hour
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In the airAn outdoor centre at Caprarola by Lake Vico offering archery, free climbing on an artificial wall, a Tibetan rope bridge and zip line, tree climbing, an agility course and orien…
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Off roadThe international kart circuit of Viterbo, which hosts national and world championship rounds, also sells kart rental, amateur races and free practice to the public.
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On the trailFree museum in Palazzo Brugiotti with 430 pieces in seven rooms, tracing ceramic production in Alto Lazio from the thirteenth to the nineteenth century, including medieval majol…
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On the trailA free museum near Piazza San Pellegrino telling the story of the porters who carry the Macchina di Santa Rosa through Viterbo each September, a UNESCO-listed tradition.
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In the hot waterTwo hyperthermal springs on Strada Terme, running into a string of pools that are open at any hour because there is nothing to close.
Free — nothing to pay
Just turn up — open air, any hour
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On the trailFour rooms in the centre of Sabaudia holding palaeontological, prehistoric and Roman finds together with marine organisms, an aquarium and a virtual dive.
See the daySulphur springs that run into rock pools with nobody charging for them. Bring flip-flops and a towel and do not expect a changing room. They are at their best on a cold day, when the steam comes off the surface and the place is empty.
Closest to Rome first. Never by who pays us.
In the hot waterThree hours in a spa set in a cave, reserved for one party at a time, in the old centre of Ariccia.
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In the hot waterA day pass to the thermal spa fed by the sulphurous Acque Albule springs on the road between Rome and Tivoli.
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In the hot waterSix pools at a steady 23°C, and the station is right behind the park.
€16 per person
Books on termediroma.org
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In the hot waterSulphur pools open till 18:30, and the operator publishes the train to get there.
€12 per person
Books on Terme Sabine di Cretone
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In the hot waterThree large sulphur-water pools, one of them for children, continuously fed with fresh water, in the countryside of Palombara Sabina about 30 km from Rome.
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In the hot waterThe medical side of the Ferentino thermal centre: inhalation cures for the respiratory system, treatments for the locomotor system and rehabilitation, using the sulphurous water…
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In the hot waterA thermal day spa at Ferentino built on a sulphurous hot spring.
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In the hot waterA wellness session in an apiary set inside the beech forest of the Simbruini park, built on apitherapy practices: bee humming, api-aromatherapy and api-sound.
See the dayDriving time from the middle of Rome, on the road network and without traffic. It tells you whether the day stands up; it is not a timetable.
Getting there
The day stays yours: you leave when you want, stop where you want, and come back when the light goes.
Affiliate link — you pay their price, never more, and they pay us. You book with Localrent, and anything about that booking goes through them.
See prices on LocalrentNo parking to find, no wrong turns, and you leave when the day is done.
Affiliate link — you pay their price, never more, and they pay us. You book with Welcome Pickups, and anything about that booking goes through them.
See prices on Welcome PickupsWhere the card says free, yes — it comes from what the operator publishes, with the date we read it. Parking, a guide or a boat out to it may not be, and where that is the case the activity page says so.
The open-air ones on this page are, and it is what the operator or the comune publishes rather than our estimate. What they are not is a spa: no changing room, no lockers, no attendant. The paid thermal establishments are a different day and have their own page.
More than most people expect. Whole hill towns, a good number of abbeys and cathedrals, Roman bridges and aqueducts standing in open country, gorges, dunes and long stretches of undeveloped coast. The grid above is everything of that kind we have found within a day of the city.
No, and that is the point of the page — there is nothing to reserve and nobody to reserve it with. What you do need to arrange is getting there and back, which for most of these means a car or a driver rather than a timetable.
Cheaper, not free. The thing itself costs nothing; the transport and the lunch are the day's budget. That is usually a better trade than it sounds, because it puts the money into the two parts of a day out that actually decide whether it was any good.
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