Two UNESCO sites in a single town: Hadrian's Villa, the palace-city the emperor built in the second century gathering the empire's wonders, and Villa d'Este, where cardinal Ippolito unleashed in the sixteenth century Europe's most celebrated garden of fountains — fifty-one of them, all gravity-fed, still playing.
The third marvel comes free at first sight: Villa Gregoriana, the romantic gorge with the great Aniene waterfall. Tivoli is half an hour from Rome and worth a full day; the sulphur baths dear to the ancients add a relaxed finale.
Near Tivoli
The closest destinations covered by our editors, with straight-line distance.
