Mission Rome: A Scavenger Hunt Adventure (Travel Guide For Kids)

If you want to have a pleasant, relaxing, wine-fuelled Roman interlude that is... I bought this for my nine-year old daughter and then spent 3 days being marched all over Rome while she figured out every possible permutation of itinerary and points scores (also tremendously good for her math). Half of me was thrilled she was so inspired and half of me wanted to take it to the very heart of the Colosseum (4 points), stab it, burn it and gouge its eyes out :) This book is like sightseeing crack, perfectly pitched at 3rd to 6th graders, and Ms Aragon has pulled together some really interesting facts and cool things to locate, which kept the interest not just of my grade schooler but also of her exhausted parents. Thank goodness we only had three days to spend in Rome and very good walking shoes. Seriously you buy this book at your peril. Caveat emptor!

We looked for ways to keep our 9 year old interested during our family trip to Italy while we took many tours to explore the city! He absolutely loved this, and it kept him engaged and interested during the tours. Our tour guide even went out of her way to help him find things in the book.

We are currently in Rome using our mission book and we are LOVING it! All 4 of our kids (6, 8, 11, & 13) are having a blast looking for details and learning about the city of Rome. I couldn't have picked a better way to do the city. We have traveled many places in Europe and this book has given the kids a way to remember what they've seen and learned. It certainly makes it feel as if the trip was worth it for them as well. I only wish we had learned about this book before we visited London and Paris! We will be purchasing any city mission book for cities we visit in the future!

I love these books! My kids are 12, 14 and 16 so I was afraid they might think they were "baby" books but they are enjoying them. I just wish there were books for London and Berlin.

I got this for a trip to Rome when my daughter was 6. It helped to keep her entertained at some major tourist sites where she would have ordinarily been bored. In fact, we ended up staying longer at some places because she really wanted to find more items. I would say this is a good book for kids in elementary school. The older kids can do the scavenger hunts on their own. The younger kids will need you to read it for them if they aren't yet fluent readers. I enjoyed doing some of the activities with my daughter. It got me to notice some things I definitely would have missed otherwise, such as the drainage system in the Pantheon. I also like that the book is thin and light and packs easily.

Our 3 kids, aged 5, 8 & 9 were so thoroughly enthralled with this book, it completely made our trip. My husband said we could not have been there without it. The kids were leading us to sites, excited to go to the next one, and we were all learning fun facts. We all made up spy names as directed and when our jet-lagged cranky kids woke up from a nap, rather than whine around, they got themselves ready and said, Let's go to Trevi Fountain, we need some more points! At the Coloseum, another mom asked me where I found the book keeping my kids so in tune. It easily bought us as the parents, extra time at each of the sites we visited, more than we would have had before meltdowns otherwise. If anything, we were getting tired out from finding all the facts -- and we went to 2 more sites than we had planned to visit just because the kids wanted to keep up their missions. We broke the spine of it from over-use on our 3rd day! I recommend this to families of all ages. We did not book guided tours at many of the attractions and this filled the gaps of giving the kids the very basics of each site (much more than they would've lost attention). My younger ones needed help reading, but this is probably good through tweens/young teens. We will definitely look for more of this series in other cities.

Our 7-year-old had an opportunity to travel to Rome with us, but wasn't that excited because he didn't know what to expect. We were so thankful to find this book -- it helped him learn about each of the places we visited by making it into a game. We spent time reading ahead to where we would visit next to be sure we knew what to look for. Having a bit of an understanding of each location in advance ensured that he was engaged in each location. He had a blast, achieved his 100 points, and is eager to travel again. Plus, as a parent, I appreciated that we could achieve the mission without going to every location in the book and that there were some activities where we could award the amount of points we wanted. We will absolutely purchase other books in this series for future travel, and I recommend it to anyone traveling with kids.

Rome in a nutshell. This book was amazing for my daughter! She would look up the different landmarks in the book and try to locate them as we were strolling through Rome. A few times made us ask for directions to a specific landmark because she was determined to find everything in that book. We weren't able to "finish" the book in one day, had to go back the next day to see the rest of the landmarks. My favorite part was the different things they have you find inside the Colosseum. Great buy!

If you have tween kids and are heading to Rome, this book is a godsend. Let's face it, churches and museums aren't that interesting when you're a kid, but this book's "missions" are just comprehensive enough to keep an 8-11 year old occupied at most of the city's famous sites, while not overwhelming him or her with information. Our daughter is 9 (and 1/2, as she reminds everyone) and has been racing around the city trying to amass as many points as possible. We definitely have seen some things that I doubt we would have without the information in this book. Take, for instance, the obelisk in the Piazza della Minerva around the corner from the Pantheon. Do you know what animal is supporting this particular obelisk? Neither would our family, if not for Mission Rome!

While seemingly designed for tweens, I think this book would also be a great buy for slightly older or younger kids. The older ones might act like they're too cool, but I'm betting they'd get some useful information and amusement from it while the younger ones would definitely enjoy it, perhaps just a bit less independently from their parents.

The absolute BEST book to keep kids engaged. We had a family vacation with 7 kids ages from 6 to 15. EVERYONE participated. We divided into teams. Initially we incentivised by offering $20 for participating. By the end of the trip they completely forgot about the incentive. I as the parent enjoyed it just as much. We all learned more than if we had just gone to the sights. I told every family with kids and high school groups about this book. An absolute MUST BUY!