3 week Italy Itinerary

(Did this topic reset somehow?)

I love Venice and would recommend you spend more time but the time you're spending there should let you know if it's for you. If hiking and outdoor exploring are your main interest then it is probably not your city.

You might think about dropping the car closer to Val Gardena - say Bolzano or Trento - and then train to Florence since you really don't want a car there and then pick one up on your way out of Florence. As others have suggested you should also drop the car after Matera as soon as you get back to a city since rental cars are an expensive burden and train travel is fast and efficient.

Naples is a huge and extremely busy city while Salerno is a small city (by US standards) and is more adjacent to nature, Pompeii, Paestum, and Naples is also 35 minutes away by train. There are also buses and ferries to Amalfi Coast if that interests you.

Generic driving advice: Be sure you get an IDP before you leave the states for everyone who might drive, read up on ZTLs before you leave and before you drive into new towns and add at least 25% to Google drive times for rural roads.

Have a great trip,
=Tod

One day in Venice is NOT enough, at least add a day.
San Venanzo is in Umbria, which is a great province to visit. I recommend visiting Gubbio, Perugia, Spoleto, Assisi and Orvieto.
Puglia is OK, but at the south of Italy, some distance from Rome. I suggest that you pass on Puglia for this trip. Instead, spend more time in Tuscany (Lucca, Siena, Pisa and San Gimigancio) or the Naples-Sorrento-Capri-Pompeii-Amalfi Coast area.

I changed my plans so I redid the post but now I am questioning everything again. I was going to do Puglia and somewhere around Naples but I thought I was stretching myself too thin so we talked about it and picked one. This is one of the most difficult trips I have ever planned. I want to go everywhere but can't of course. We have that time in San Venanzo already set. We generally don't want to be surrounded my tons of people all the time and I have always dreamed of an Italian road trip.

We almost didn't do Venice at all but decided to start the trip there when flying into Venice made sense. We have a jet lagged day and a less jet lagged day there in the current itinerary.

I also recommend all the places in Umbria noted by Geovagriffith.
If you keep Puglia, and if your flights are not set, maybe see if you could fly out of Bari or Brindisi instead of backtracking to Rome.
If you drop Puglia, rather than adding a new region such as Bologna, I suggest that you could easily enjoy an additioanl day or more in any or all of your previous stops, especially Venice but also Tuscany and/or Dolomites.

I would go to Florence directly after Venice. Agree with others’ comment - Venice amount of time is SO short! Usually a 1-day stop, especially with jet lag, equals people not liking lovely Venice.

Take the fast train to Florence and skip renting a car until heading to Val Gardena. Now you can arrive in the center of Florence by train and not waste time dealing with parking the car outside Florence & reduce rental car $.

I love the Puglia region - going this year for the third time. Your itinerary made me sigh. : ( I’m having a problem narrowing mine down to a week in that area. This will sound radical to some of our forum, but I would take some of the days from Rome and give them to the Puglia region. You very likely will be back in Rome on a future trip. I would place your days in Rome at the end of the itinerary.

You will likely be going to the main cities in the Puglia region where you don’t necessarily need a car. That will save you more $$.

Just saw your update now. With your additional comments I would do two full days in Venice, two in Florence, head to the Tuscan valley, and I would end with just a couple of days in Rome. Enjoy Puglia at your pace with the few extra days added, : )

It’s very easy to do the Top 3 (V, F, R) with additional days during a future trip, and it sounds like your current priority is the less busy locations.