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12 days, Sorrento, Florence, Rome. Suggestions on travel and tours needed

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Our family of four, including two boys 15 and 21 will be traveling to Italy in May of 2016 for about 12 days.

I am asking for advice on keeping our sons busy and interested rather than turning having them "bored" at multiple museums. Our schedule is as follows

We arrive in Naples and have already booked an apartment at a marina Grande in Sorrento for four days. We expect to tour Pompeii (half day?) and possibly Vesuvius to make it a one day trip, Positano and Naples one day and Capri for a day.

We then want to travel by high speed train to Florence where we have an apartment by the Duomo for three days and then to a Grieve in Chianti apartment for two more nights. We expect to see the major sights in Glorence and then wanted to tour Chianti by rental car to sightsee and drive to Pisa (possibly use a bus?) for a half day to full day trip.
After that we will again travel by high speed train to Rome and spend the remainder there. The apartment is close to the Forum, Coloseum and that general area.

I know that we have a very busy schedule but the apartments are booked and we wanted to get a small sampling of each area so that we can then go back to one region for a longer trip in the future. Our total exposure to Italy is a single day in Sorrento/Positano, Rome and Pisa/Florence as part of a cruise. We used small guided tours and fell in love with the country.

Any suggestions on must see items or areas would be appreciated. Any help understanding the train (including how baggage is handled on the high speed) would help. We have no issue walking Rome with a guide and both my wife and I are trying to get some conversational Italian crammed in before our trip. A GPS will be with us for walking and driving. We will only have a car in Tuscany and rather than drive to Rome we decided to take the train unless someone here chimes in about driving there're and then dropping of the rental.

Thanks and my apologies for the wall of text, super excited to go on this vacation as we have never done anything like this with the family. Once in a lifetime for us so we really want the boys to enjoy it.

Posted by
11314 posts

We expect to tour Pompeii (half day?) and possibly Vesuvius to make it a one day trip, Positano and Naples one day and Capri for a day.

Pompeii is definitely a 1/2 day and you can make it a very full day by adding Vesuvius. Positano and Naples are in opposite directions, you will have to pick one to make it work. Personally I would do Naples one day then a beach day at Positano, skipping Capri which is over priced and a bit boring IMHO.

Baggage on the high-speed trains can be stored overhead, between the seats in the A-shaped space left between some rows, or in the racks at the end of the compartments. Hopefully you are packing light with a 21" (max) rollaboard and a day pack per person. Best to keep it close to you as possible, but 24" and larger suitcases will only fit in the racks near the doors.

Do not drive to Rome. Drop the car and relax on the train.

Posted by
933 posts

We just returned from 3wks in Italy. We did Herculaneum - the ruins are very preserved, lots of mosaics & tiles still intact since the eruption in 79AD, and it is MUCH LESS crowded than Pompeii. TripAdvisor has good reviews and photos. Rick Steves has a great chapter in his book that we followed - do not miss the boat houses with skeletons of the people as they tried to escape to the water. We spent 5 days in Sorrento & loved it (we took the train to Herculaneum for the day-easy). We also did a day trip to the Amalfi, Positano, Ravello which was perfect. I agree with skipping Capri - Sorrento and the Amalfi Coast are much better. Capri is pretty, but very touristy and expensive and Sorrento and Amalfi are stunning too. You will want time in Sorrento and Pompeii/Herculaneum . . . a day in Capri will take away from time.

https://www.sharedtoursmondoguideforricksteves.com

We spent 10days of our trip on a RS tour (Venice, Florence, Rome) - and LOVED those cities. We returned to Florence on our own after Sorrento and did Day Trips to Siena and San Gimignano and Pisa and Chianti (all out of Florence). We used WalkAbout Florence for our tours and we were VERY pleased.

https://www.walkaboutflorence.com/italy-tuscany-florence-tours?gclid=CL638rHT_8gCFVMvgQodTycJrA

We booked our high speed train on Italo over Trenitalia because is was more user friendly here at home and we were very pleased with Italo. We traveled Carry On only - we each had a RS 20in Rolling CarryOn and a RS EuroBag and we had NO trouble getting on and off the train with that, but we did see LOTS of people struggling with large bags, so go small - there are a few steps to get on. Since our bags were not big, we were able to store them above us. Be sure and get your high speed train tickets 120days out for the best deals. The Italo website was very easy to use and you can see the trains, classes, seats, etc before your book. Just remember Rome=Roma, Florence=Firenze, Naples=Napoli when booking. We had read that Italo didn't have as many options, but we compared schedules, stations, times, prices with Trenitalia and found they were comparable. Roma Termini and Firenze SMN are the MAIN stations in those cities.

http://www.italotreno.it/en

The RS Italy book is VERY good and I recommend it. Also, download "CityMaps 2 Go" before you leave and it is a great GPS without using data. Also, RS has an AudioEurope App that you can download and listen to many tours.

Posted by
7175 posts

It appears this is what you have ...
Sorrento - 4 nts >> Florence - 3 nts >> Chianti - 2 nts >> Rome - 3 nts

Day 1 - Arrive Naples, transfer to Sorrento - 4 nts
Day 2 - Amalfi + Positano
Day 3 - Pompeii + Naples
Day 4 - Capri
Day 5 - Train to Florence - 3 nts
Day 6 - Florence sights
Day 7 - Florence sights
Day 8 - Pick up hire car. Drive via Siena to Greve - 2 nts
Day 9 - Exploring Chianti
Day 10 - Drive via Montepulciano to Florence (??). Return hire car. Train to Rome - 3 nts
Day 11 - Colosseum, Forum, Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps, Pantheon, Piazza Navona
Day 12 - St Peters and the Vatican
Day 13 - Depart Rome

Posted by
5 posts

Thank you for the suggestions!

We will only be in Sorrento for three nights with the fourth day being the travel day from Sorrento to Florence.

Plans slightly change there with only two days in Florence and Three in Chianti. The third day of travel from Florence to Chianti we expect to spend most of the day in Florence and arrive late in Chianti. Once in Chianti we hope to drive to Pisa as part of our trip.

After reading a bit it looks like we will be packing 21 inch suitcases to make the train travel easier and we may use private transfers to and from Sorrento just to make things easier. Local public transport does not appear to be an issue with us for sightseeing, we just don't want to have to rely on it when we are carrying luggage.

Thanks again!

Posted by
7175 posts

Day 1 - Arrive Naples. Transfer to Sorrento - 3 nts
Day 2 - Amalfi + Positano
Day 3 - Capri
Day 4 - Pompeii. Train to Florence - 2 nts
Day 5 - Florence sights
Day 6 - Florence sights. Pick up hire car. Drive to Greve - 3 nts
Day 7 - Pisa+Lucca
Day 8 - Siena+San Gimignano
Day 9 - Chianti drive. Return hire car in Florence. Train to Rome - 3 nts
Day 10 - Colosseum, Forum, Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps, Pantheon, Piazza Navona
Day 11 - St Peters and the Vatican
Day 12 - Depart Rome

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