12 Days on the Ground in Italy- Rome, Cinque Terre, Florence, Venice

I'd skip the Cinque Terre, as much as I love it. You'll have half a day there, and as much time detouring on trains instead of going directly from Florence to Venice. And in April, what if it rains? What if the trails are closed? As an alternative, I would spend the extra night in Florence and pencil in a day trip for that extra day - and if the weather is nice and you feel like it, do the day trip to Cinque Terre. Shouldn't be that busy in early April. If it's rainy, you can day trip to a town like Pisa, Lucca, or Sienna instead.

I agree with Andrew about not overnighting in CT. But I'll go one further and suggest you flip the itinerary and start in Venice, flying home from Rome. Only because morning flights out of Venice can be difficult to manage unless you pay for a very expensive water taxi or stay at an airport hotel the night before you leave. If you can get an afternoon flight out of Venice, then it won't matter.

Seems like if you had your heart set on Cinque Terra you might want to do that after Rome and before Florence/Venice. Less backtracking.

Either way, you're not really going to have time to see/do anything in CT since by the time you actually get to any of the 5 towns, it will be time to leave.

Depending on how you're traveling around Italy, you might consider a hill town that's on the way to Florence, rather than CT.

It appears that you really only have ten and one half days available to see and do things -- Mar. 24 and April 5 are departure days and really can't be counted. If I calculated correctly, you have (assuming you get to the hotel by noon) half a day on Mar. 25 and ten other full days. You will change your location four times and will "lose" at least three quarters of a day to a full day each time. It's not just the travel time -- you lose time packing up, checking out, getting to the train station, getting to the new hotel, checking in, and etc. That really only gives you about six to seven usable days to see and do things. My suggestion is skip the Cinque Terra and just do Rome, Florence, and Venice. Perhaps four full days in Rome, three in Florence, and three in Venice. It's not my intention to rain on your parade as it sounds like a super trip. I just hate for you to make the mistake too many people make by trying to do too much in too little time and having too many memories of train stations and rushing hither, thither, and yon.

If you are planning this trip for 2018, remember that Easter Sunday is April 1st.