Rome-Florence/Sienna-Venice, how many days?

[ChgoBob]

Skip Pisa. (personal opinion)

You can do Sienna and Lucca by bus. You can rent a car, and driving is fine, but parking is THE problem, especially in Florence. Rent only for one day at a time, if rates are similar for 2 day rentals. Why pay to park at night, even IF you can find a spot? We wound up paying for overnight parking in the same rental garage as the rental car!

A small van tour for wine country is ideal. They do the driving, and you do the sightseeing. (and wine tasting)

If this is your 1st time in Venice, stay in Venice. We stayed at the Best Western in Mestre once (for an early air departure, before the airport hotels were built). The hotel is great. They have 1€ tickets for the train at the front desk. It's ideal for the train, but it's a pain at night traveling from Venice after a great meal and liter of wine. Spend the bucks for Venice. It's worth it.

Florence is a great base for day trips by train. Bologna, Arezzo, Perugia, and Orvietto are done easily.

Day trips from Venice include Padua (skip Monday morning) and Verona.

Yes, -planning is a good part of the fun.

We always use the Star Alliance for out trips. Take connects in Munich over Frankfort, when available. Much simpler.

[philemer]

Thanks cooperhs and ChgoBob for the great ideas. We do plan on staying in Venice. We're going to try and get award tix into FCO and out of MXP or FLR. AA, like many carriers, seems to only have one C/J award seat on most flts. Don't have enough miles for *A. Maybe a CC swap in my future.

[aamilesslave]

Originally Posted by ChgoBob

Skip Pisa. (personal opinion)

The only reason to go to Pisa is for the Leaning Tower and Duomo. If you do want to go, it is a quick 1/2 day trip by train from Florence. Go, see, snap photots, get out.

Originally Posted by ChgoBob

A small van tour for wine country is ideal. They do the driving, and you do the sightseeing. (and wine tasting)

I did this with the Accidental Tourist and had a great time. It was January, so there was just me and two great couples from the states.

The tour I took with them was a tour of a winery that also produced olive oil. Afterwards, there was a great lunch at a lovely Tuscan farmhouse (the "Snooze Tour"). There was also a cooking class option to make the pasta for the lunch, which some of the others on the tour participated.

[azeckel]

We did a lot of these cities in May and learned a LOT.

Rick Steves: His books are great for all of these cities. He gives advice on museum passes, city passes, etc. Some of the prices were out of date in the 2009 book but were within a few euros. I would also suggest downloading his podcasts - it's like a free audioguide to all the big sites in europe. One of our favorites was the vaporetti tour in venice. Just follow his instructions to board the right vaporetti and listen as he narrates your trip.

Rome: I'd say it's worth biting the bullet and finding a B&B near the sites you want to see. We spent Marriott points and stayed at the converted "courtyard" out in the suburbs. They offered a free shuttle once an hour, but the hours weren't ideal and if the shuttle filled up (~16 people) you were out of luck. Also, it only took us to the metro station near the Vatican, so there was an additional ride into town. Getting back in the evening was a pain as the last shuttle was at 9:30pm which meant we had to leave the city by 9pm to take the metro to the shuttle and if there was a line of people, we'd still get stuck with an expensive cab ride.

Venice: Others have said it, but Mestre is quite far from the center of Venice. We stayed at a B&B we found on TA which wasn't great in terms of accomodations, but the location was amazing. Venice is so much nicer at night once the cruise ships leave and staying on the mainland would mean not spending as much time in Venice.

Tuscany: We LOVED the agriturismo we found on TA. Agriturismo Savernano - Great place! There is a train station down the road (Figlio Verdano or something like that) and there is a Hertz car rental there. If you have the time, I would stay in the country and day trip to Florence, Sienna, Montepulciano, San Gimigniano, etc. We actually stayed in Florence one night, and if you want to see all the museums it might make sense to spread them out over a couple of days. If I could do it again, though, I would pare down my museum visits in Florence to just a couple to do it in a full day and base my travel from an agriturismo in Tuscany.