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Agriturismo Marciano, Podere Spedalone, or Cretaiole?

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Hello, All!
My husband, sister, and I are planning a trip to Italy next May, 2018. My husband and I have been to Rome, Florence, and Venice and now want to visit Tuscany, Umbria, and Cinque Terre. My sister has never been to Italy so we want to show her why we think it's so special. What we most want to do is stroll, chill, eat good food, drink good wine, and simply soak in our surroundings. The trip duration will be about 2 weeks for her and 3 weeks for my husband and me. I have read some reviews from this site and from Trip Advisor, along with Rick Steves' guidebook. I have a few questions based on what I've read but I don't want to overshadow any particular question because I asked too many at once. So, may I begin with a couple?

  1. If my sister only has two weeks to be in Italy, would you consider 1 week in Tuscany too much?
  2. Trip Advisor has Agriturismo Podere Spedalone (Pienza area) and Agriturismo Marciano (Siena area) as the number 1 rated agriturismos in their region/area. Cretaiole has been praised on this site, I know. All sound divine and there's no bad choice here. So my question is whether staying in one 'region/area' over another is preferable? And if anyone's familiar with these agriturismos to help me choose one over another?

Thanks so much!! More questions to follow. :-)

Posted by
1005 posts
  1. A week in Tuscany sounds about right to me, but then most of the itineraries of Italy I read spin my head and not in a good way. Our favorite trips to Italy have usually involved at least one week long stay.
  2. I've only stayed at Agriturismo Marciano, which was wonderful, but I really like its location only a km or two outside of Siena. There's much to do in Siena itself and you're only a quick taxi ride away. (We had a car, but that was easier than parking and allowed for wine drinking.) I've stayed on a farm outside Pienza, also a lovely town, but it's much smaller, and it wasn't someplace I needed to return to day after day. I found plenty of hill towns accessible from both places. It might be helpful to look at a map and see if day trips you want to do are closer to one than the other.
Posted by
87 posts

Hi, Ruth. Thanks for your reply. I think my original question may have been too specific so I just posted my draft itinerary, with lingering questions, as a new topic. Check it out. You may have more words of wisdom. :-)

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