Florence and where?

Go to Italy only.

Get a guidebook - the RS books for Italy are good for first-time visitors - and let that help you decide what you want to do. Your daughter may have some ideas, too.

My plan would be something like this:

Weekday flights may tend to be cheaper, so if your plan is to spend Friday-Sunday with your daughter, fly into Venezia a few days earlier, spend a couple of nights there, then take the train to Firenze, spend time with your daughter, train to Roma for a few days, back to see your daughter again if that fits your schedule, fly out from Venezia, Pisa or Milano.

I agree with Zoe, go to Italy only. Decide which cities near Florence you really want to visit. Most first-time visitors want to see Venice, Florence, and Rome. If that's you, I suggest flying into Venice for a day or two. Take the train to Florence to arrive either late afternoon on Thursday or early on Friday morning to spend the weekend with your daughter. Then, take the train to Rome to visit there for a few days and fly out from Rome.

You can also just fly round trip to Rome, take the train to Florence for the time you spend with you daughter, then come back to Rome. There's plenty to do in Rome, and you can take a day trip to Orvieto on one of your "Rome" days.

Since your time is pretty limited, I think it's best to keep travel days to a minimum. Good luck and have fun. Florence is wonderful!

WE flew into Rome (Roma) for 4 nights, took the high speed train to Venice (Venezia), spent 3 nights, then the train to Florence (Firenza) for 3-4 nights. We booked all train tickets and learned how, why, and when (right now for Sept/Oct) on www.seat61.com. We returned to Rome to see the Pope and stay another couple nights then flew back to the US. Train tickets go on sale around 120 days prior to your travel date and get more expensive. You have to use the Italian names for cities booking train tickets. I don't know if some airports are cheaper or not but maybe some airlines are cheaper, but not likely unless you do some research. www.tripadvisor.com has an airline forum plus forums that are specific for the cities in Europe and not just countries. You are pretty late to be booking flights, hotels, and train tickets to get the best of each but you are not too late by any means. Good luck.

I agree with the others.

• Confine your visit to cities in Italy. Go out today and buy Rick's Italy guidebook.. Spending a few days in Venice and/other Rome before and after you see your daughter would be fairly easy for first time visitors, since both cities are used to dealing with hordes of tourists.

• Play around on kayak.com to see what combination of cities gives you a lower price on flights. Don't worry so much about the connections at first. Because of where you live, you'll have one or two connecting flights each way. Look at flying round trip to Rome or multicity into Venice and out of Rome. Flying out of Florence seems to be more expensive.

• Use the train between cities in Italy. Venice, Florence and Rome are all connected by high speed rail and are the best way to go, delivering you to the heart of each city. Use the man in seat 61 to educate yourself about European train travel. Remember to use the Italian place names when making reservations. Reservations for your dates are available now.

• Use a site like booking.com to check for hotel availability and rates. I also like to cross check with TripAdvisor for reviews. Then book directly on the hotels booking site ( providing their rates are equal or less than booking.come prices.

If you have a real carry-on (22×14×9), there shouldn't be much trouble with the trains. You don't have many train journeys to plan. You can use TrenItalia, buy your tickets online and print them at home. Be sure to tell your CC provider that you're going to make a purchase in Italy. If you use a Visa card, you may get a pop-up asking you to sign up for verified by Visa. That was easy for me. All it wanted was for me to create a password.

As far as money and time goes, the fast Freccia (arrow) trains are better than flying for your journeys and if you buy early enough, they are very cheap. My trip from Roma Termini to Bologna in June took 2 hours and 15 minutes and cost about €30. However, the fastest the train went was only 250 kph.

Be sure to read all the advice here on the RS website, but especially the tips on Money, Security and Packing Light. I also highly recommend the Sarah Murdock video on packing and a visit to the Forum on packing.

It sounds like you plan to spread this trip over 2 weekends with your daughter, but it is a little confusing. I think you need to get the dates settled, then the flights, keeping in mind that you may tweak the dates a bit because of flight availability or price. My favorite way to check flights is to use Google Flights.

You will need to work with it a bit, and I expect that there are no nonstops from Cleveland, so you will have to select "1 stop or fewer" under Stops, but you can see the prices on a calendar when you select your departure and return dates. Remember that you will leave the US the evening of one day and arrive in Italy the morning of the next day, probably with very little sleep in between.

Also remember that it may be somewhat cheaper to fly into one city and back home from another. That's the "multi-city" option you can pick by clicking on the default "round trip" link.

As others have said, stay in Italy. You barely have time to visit your daughter on the two weekends and visit one other place in-between. I'm not sure what you meant by the Greece questions, but you definitely don't have time to do that.

Wow you guys are awesome. Thank you so much to all of you for taking so much time to answer my questions and give me advice. I really appreciate it. Thanks for the clarity and advice on staying in Italy. That is our plan for sure. Researching now and narrowing down how long I want to be in each place. I may be back with more questions...lol...but at least I feel like I've got a place to start.

Thanks again.

Kristi

First, will your daughter want to go out of town with you for either or both weekends? Or do you want to stay in Florence with her - one weekend or both?

If she's going to travel with you, start in Venice where she can meet you. It's the best place to get over jetlag because it's low-key. If not, start in Florence. Either way, she can help you get oriented to Italy - signs, customs, money, etc.

Great advice you already have.

I agree, stay in Italy.

I would recommend flying into Rome early in a week, like Monday and then taking the train to Florence on Friday to see your Daughter. After visiting with here for the weekend, take side trip, like to Siena, Lucca, Pisa, Orvieto. Then take the train to Venice, spend a couple of nights there and fly home from Venice.

I'd consider staying in Florence midweek and seeing your daughter in the evenings. Then travel with her to see Venice, for example. You would have days free to see Florence which your daughter will get her fair share of anyway. Our hosts guidebook has a good section on the Oltrarno neighborhood in Florence, which would be near where your daughter is I'd guess.

I think you will be best doing Venice, Florence, Rome. I'd fly into Venice, train to Florence, then train to Rome. That's plenty for ten days - at least two nights in Venice, at least three nights in Florence and the rest in Rome. Either spend time with your daughter in Florence or have her come as part of your time in Rome.

There is a lot more to see in the area but ten days isn't enough time to add anything else. If you want to add something, figure out what you want to drop to accomodate the extra time.

If you want to go elsewhere, it will most likely require renting a car - so more planning.