pdhenry

I've cut-and-pasted from a post I made last year:

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Here's our itinerary for a 2-week trip back in May, 2002:

* Flight from US to Zurich; Rail ride over the alps via Milan and Genoa to the Cinque Terra region. (Rail day 1 of a 3-country SelectPass)
* 2 nights in Riomaggiore, southernmost of the 5 villages. One day is just about enough to sample each village; you can walk or take the train the mile or two between each village. You can buy a park pass that includes the train fare, so no railpass day required for exploring.
* Train to Rome, stopping in Pisa around lunch. We walked from the train station to the Tower and Campo. (Rail Day 2)
* 4 or 5 nights in Rome. Location is not tremendously important if you're somewhat close to a subway stop and/or one of the major sightseeing areas. We were a block or two from the Vatican.
* Night train from Rome to Venice. Worth it for the experience of a sleeper car, but we drove back through the region later and I realized that we had missed some nice secnery. The plus side is that we arrived in Venice about 6 AM and walked from the train station to our hotel (near Piazza San Marco) as the city was waking up.(Rail Day 3)
* Two nights in Venice. Could have used another day or two here; we really didn't get to explore as much as we would have liked.
* Pick up rental car (office near train station); drive from Venice to Siena, skirting Bologna and Florence on the way.
* Side trip from Siena to Deruta; bought about €400 of high-quality hand-painted ceramics from one of the shops on top of the hill. Had the stuff shipped home. Back to Siena that night.
* Drive from Siena to small village of Belgirate on Lago Maggiore north of Milan for 2 nights.
* Day on Lago Maggiore, riding the public ferry to Stresa and Verbania for exploring.
* Short drive to Milan Malpensa Airport; drop off the car and fly back to Zurich. Short train trip to Luzern for afternoon exploring; back to Zurich for dinner, spend night near airport. (Rail Day 4)
* Fly back to US.

I developed the itinerary after doing a lot of research and consideration of what was important to our first trip to Italy. In retrospect I wouldn't have eliminated anything, but maybe a day less in Rome and a day more in Venice.

This comment may get negative feedback, but as a first-time visitor you should read Rick Steves' Italy book (and his website) to help trim your list of places to visit. His restaurant recommendations were all good, but at one restaurant in Rome we realized that just about everyone else had a copy of his book in their daypacks (we asked; everyone got a good laugh).

Other tips:

You could either plan your itinerary in detail before going (as we did) or play it by ear, going for more flexibility (an extra night in Vennice traded for a night somewhere else later, perhaps). Keep in mind that September is still busy from a tourism perspective, so you'll have less hassle and better accomodations if you plan ahead.

The turnpikes in Italy are fantastic. They even take credit cards at the automated toolbooths. Just stay out of the left lane.

It's much cheaper to make train reservations in Italy than using a service like RailEurope. We reserved the Rome-Venice sleeper while in Rome. But we would have benefitted from reservations on the Zurich-Milan train in a special observation car, but it was too late to reserve the morning of arrival in Zurich.

Have fun.

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Postscript notes:
- Add a day in Venice, spend a day less in Rome than I did.
- I didn't sleep well on the 'sleeper" train. Caveat emptor.

10sgirl

posted

10sgirl

I agree that Venice would be more romantic but not for 4-5 days alone. If you go to Venice suggest taking day trip to Sienna. Check out Rick Steves Italy book for reference. Great guide-never let you down. Aside from Venice, suggest Cinque Terre (five towns). Stay in Vernazza but the other 4 towns are just as nice like Monterosso or Corniglia. This will be great for 4 days. You could take the train to each town a day and a great way to spend the days. Plenty of hiking (if you enjoy hiking) but great shopping too. Maybe do both and stay in Cinque Terre for a couple of days and then to Venice for three. The train takes about 4-5 hours from Cinque Terre to Venice. Easy.

Kathrin

Siena would be a nice day-trip from Florence, but not from Venice. That's too far.

TRAVELSIG

A day trip to Siena is crazy- way too far from Venezia. If you are thinking of a nice day trip from Venice consider:
-Padova
-Bologna
-Conegliano
-Cortina
-Asolo
-Treviso

10sgirl

My bad, you are right. I totally got them confused. I wouldn't recommend Florence for romance though. I was going to do a day trip to Sienna and never got the chance-forgot it was from Florence not Venice. Venice is great still. I hear Bologna is a fun place.

LAX

Thanks for your inputs so far. Well, it seems like we have decided on a 7-day RT cruise leaving from Venice. That would leave us about 6 days (seventh day is travel day) post-cruise. I was thinking about staying in Venice for 3 days (2 nights) and then take an overnight train (the third night post cruise) to Rome for the remaining 3 days (3 nights--a morning flight on the last day). Is this too ambitious? Like I mentioned earlier, I don't want to rush during this trip at all. However, someone has commented that staying in Venice for 6 days may be a bit too long. Any thoughts/comments much appreciated.

LAX

pdhenry

See about getting an early checkin in Rome. On our Rome-Venice "sleeper" I didn't sleep as well as I would have hoped and our room in Venice wasn't available until about 1 PM.

Also, in Rome I'd avoid the morning rush hour subways with luggage if possible. I was busy enough keeping people out of my pockets...

ChgoBob

Your suggestion can be done. The train station in Venice has a luggage storage room for your last day there, but often has very long lines. It's a 1 hour flight on Air One (partner of LH), and relatively inexpensive if you want to spend the 3rd night in Venice, and fly to Rome the next morning. Another option is Florence for several nights, vs Rome, but you have to decide what you would rather see. Rome has the ancient history and Vatican. Florence has the arts. (very generalized comparison, so nobody tear me apart, OK? ) It's really your choice, since even if you had 30 days, you won't see it all, and you have to go back.