If you're flying to Rome and you need to book an airport transfer there are a few things you need to know. The city of Rome has got two airports: Fiumicino and Ciampino. Their names rhyme and they sound similar, but they are not similar at all and they're everything but close, so don't get confused!
Fiumicino, also Known as Leonardo Da Vinci Airport, was the first one to be open to public and still stays the main one. Ciampino Airport, instead, smaller but a little bit closer to the centre, has recently been converted to the transportation of regular people: infact it was once only a military airport. It's only in the last ten or fifteen years that Ciampino Airport has become just as popular as Fiumicino, and this is due to the great development of low budget airlines in Europe and the boom of low cost flights: companies like RyanAir, EasyJet and many other smaller ones lands here coming form all over Europe.
Fiumicino Airport instead is the Airport of the big airlines and it doesn't deal with domestic and international flights only, but also with intercontinental ones. Its larger dimensions and its very elegant duty free zone makes Fiumicino airport much better than Ciampino to spend some time in. With its three terminals and regular shops, it's not only a pleasant place to land in or getting off from, but also a not boring one for waiting for someone to arrive. Ciampino has not such amenities and its dimensions can result claustrophobic for a frequent flyer used to the international airport standards: but it is slowly improving and right in the 2007 a whole new pavilion is about to be open.
Both Airports of Rome, as you can see, are more use to be called with the name of the small village they are close to: Fiumicino is a small town on the sea and it hosts a military port and a big outpost of the Italian Navy (Marina Militare), while Ciampino is a very commercial small town that for the fact to be so close to the actual Rome is seen as a kind of detached district. But while the Fiumicino Airport real name, which we already said being "Leonardo Da Vinci" (from the name of the great genius of the 15th-16th century), is commonly used, no one instead calls Ciampino Airport with its real name "Giovan Battista Pastine", probably because nobody knows who he was!
Also on your flight ticket to Rome and on your luggage abbreviations of those "nicknames" will be used: FCO stands for Fiumicino Airport, while CIA, far away from indicating the secret services of the United States, will be the tag for Ciampino Airport. So, while you're booking a car transfer service on the web and they ask you in which airport you're going to land, just read your ticket and you won't risk your driver to be waiting for you at the arrivals gate of the wrong Airport.
Fiumicino, also Known as Leonardo Da Vinci Airport, was the first one to be open to public and still stays the main one. Ciampino Airport, instead, smaller but a little bit closer to the centre, has recently been converted to the transportation of regular people: infact it was once only a military airport. It's only in the last ten or fifteen years that Ciampino Airport has become just as popular as Fiumicino, and this is due to the great development of low budget airlines in Europe and the boom of low cost flights: companies like RyanAir, EasyJet and many other smaller ones lands here coming form all over Europe.
Fiumicino Airport instead is the Airport of the big airlines and it doesn't deal with domestic and international flights only, but also with intercontinental ones. Its larger dimensions and its very elegant duty free zone makes Fiumicino airport much better than Ciampino to spend some time in. With its three terminals and regular shops, it's not only a pleasant place to land in or getting off from, but also a not boring one for waiting for someone to arrive. Ciampino has not such amenities and its dimensions can result claustrophobic for a frequent flyer used to the international airport standards: but it is slowly improving and right in the 2007 a whole new pavilion is about to be open.
Both Airports of Rome, as you can see, are more use to be called with the name of the small village they are close to: Fiumicino is a small town on the sea and it hosts a military port and a big outpost of the Italian Navy (Marina Militare), while Ciampino is a very commercial small town that for the fact to be so close to the actual Rome is seen as a kind of detached district. But while the Fiumicino Airport real name, which we already said being "Leonardo Da Vinci" (from the name of the great genius of the 15th-16th century), is commonly used, no one instead calls Ciampino Airport with its real name "Giovan Battista Pastine", probably because nobody knows who he was!
Also on your flight ticket to Rome and on your luggage abbreviations of those "nicknames" will be used: FCO stands for Fiumicino Airport, while CIA, far away from indicating the secret services of the United States, will be the tag for Ciampino Airport. So, while you're booking a car transfer service on the web and they ask you in which airport you're going to land, just read your ticket and you won't risk your driver to be waiting for you at the arrivals gate of the wrong Airport.