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PRIVATE TOURS: Eye Opener Guided Tours for a personal experience of Roman art & life;

               Rome and Vatican City Tours with a professional and friendly guide 

                        that can transform your ordinary holiday into an extraordinary journey, 

                                 the Grand Tour of a lifetime!

 

                                                          Trevi Fountain

 

Through Eye Opener Tours, I offer two kinds of  Private Tours:

Classical Tours  are our leading choice of itineraries conceived for individuals or small family groups. They can operate whithout limitations of pre-arranged schedule, so that you can book by e-mail whichever tour you like: I will be pleased to personally conduct your visit if possible, or arrange for one of my trusted colleagues to guide you on that day.  Please visit the Eye Opener Tours List for programs' description and e-mail me your requirements if you can't find a scheduled tour to book, or if you prefer to be on your own.  I will promptly reply with the appropriate information and hope to.. quote you happy:  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it  

 

     Capitoline Venus Palazzo Massimo alle Terme, Niobe's daughter. Detail. Museo centrale Montemartini, Tombstone, Palazzo Massimo alle Terme, Afrodite. Detail. 

 

Personalized Tours  are group or individual tours conceived to include specific sites requested by the customer.  In fact, you might already be an experienced traveller and have visited Rome once or twice,  OR you could trust your guide's  experience to choose unmissable places, especially if you are a first-time visitor.   As a  guide, I will be at the disposal of you and your party whenever possible, or team up with one of my skilled colleagues.  For some itineraries, a limousine is recommended, for others we can use a horse buggy or just public transport.   The duration of each tour is roughly 2-4 hours or slightly longer.

 

              St Costanza, Mosaic. Photograph from 2006.

Possible itineraries for a one-day or half day tour:  

  • Vatican Museums/Sistine Chapel and St Peter's Basilica.
  • Imperial Rome: Venice Square, Trajan's Column, Roman Forum and Constantine's Arch.
  • Colosseum, Appian Way, Catacombs
  • Spanish Steps, Pantheon, Piazza Navona, Palazzo Altemps and/or Museo Napoleonico/Museo Praz
  • Mosaic Tours (you might like to read "Mosaic, The work of the Muses"** in preparation for such tours)
  • Personalized tours can be arranged in various combinations... we will be creative!

Caravaggio, Boy with a basket of fruit. Detail. Borghese Gallery Caravaggio, Bacchus. Detail. Galleria Borghese Caravaggio?[MASTER of the Hartford Still-life] Still-Life with Flowers and Fruit. Borghese Gallery  

 

Cost will be quoted after deciding the itinerary, and will fluctuate according to whether a car is used, the number of participants, and whether or not there are entrance fees to pay.  To confirm your booking, especially on  busy periods, you could be asked to send a payment through PayPal, just 25% of the total price.

WE WILL ALSO ACCEPT SCHOOL PARTIES,  TRAVEL CLUBS MEMBERS,  FAMILIES,  SENIOR CITIZENS ...  but no grumpy faces!    Smile

SUBMIT YOUR REQUEST NOW:  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

 

 

**Our book Mosaic, the Work of the Muses has even been used in a University Course (Seattle): it was presented as "A concise and yet clear introduction to the subject of mosaics, tracing the development of the art form from early pebble mosaics into its three main branches: Ancient Roman/ Byzantine, Pietre Dure and Micromosaic. Well illustrated. A good basic work for understanding the art form." Please visit also Sonia King-mosaicworks.com if you like to know more about this art and it's practical applications from a renowned artist.  Mosaic, the Work of the Muses is included in her Recommended Books section -although at the end, being sold from Italy that for some reasons is not yet in the Amazon gateway!

  

*From “A la recherche du temps perdue” «Le seul véritable voyage, le seul bain de Jouvence, ce ne serait pas d’aller vers de nouveaux paysages, mais d’avoir d’autres yeux, de voir l’univers avec les yeux d’un autre, de cent autres, de voir les cents univers que chacun d’eux voit, que chacun d’eux est ; et cela nous le pouvons avec un Elstir, avec un Vinteuil, avec leurs pareils, nous volons vraiment d’étoiles en étoiles. » Marcel Proust, La Prisonnière, page 762, La Pléiade tome 3, Éditions Gallimard

-Literally translated would sound “A real voyage, the only that rejuvenate, would be not in going to discover new landscapes, but to have other eyes, to see the universe with the eyes of another, of a hundred others, to see the hundreds of universes that each of them see, that each of them is; and this we can with an Elstir (painter), with a Vinteuil (classical music), with the like we can really fly from star to star.”  

 

 

Roman mosaic pattern, II cent. (from Dyonisus Watering Flowers, Vatican Museum, Upper Gangway)

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