BIGGEST SURPRISE IN ITALY.................

Meeting Rick Steves as we were checking into our hotel in Siena (he was checking out) haha....can you imagine! We told him we had just used his audio tour for Venice and Florence (including Uffizi) and planned to use it for Siena and Rome. All were great and offered a good introduction to the main sites in each city. We used Walks of Italy tours for more detailed and formal touring of the main attractions.
2 Nights Venice: easy, quick and cheap 75 minute train to Varona
2 Nights Varona: easy, quick and cheap) 90 minute train to Florence
3 Nights Florence: easy, quick and cheap) 75 minute bus to Siena
2 Nights Siena: easy and cheap) 120 minutes bus to Rome
4 Nights Rome: easy, expensive and long flight back to USA
In each city we tried to venture off the tourist track.

Venice was cold, rainy when we arrived and St. Marks square was a mass of selfie sticks and umbrellas. Unfortunately I was sick and unable to go on the tour the following morning, which my husband thought was great. The afternoon we spent in San Polo and Cannaregio.
Varona was a lovely surprise and a great way to refresh from jet lag and sickness (ugh). Beautiful city, lovely outside dining everywhere. Toured on our own, the colosseum, basilica and Castelvecchio. May 1 was labor day and there was a great celebration with food, drinks and one of the best live jazz performances I've ever seen (husband is a musician and loves jazz so we to to lots of jazz clubs). Supposedly this was put on my the local conservatory both faculty and students, amazing!!
Florence was lots of art! Audio tour and Walks of italy tour of David and the Duomo were great. Uffizi gallery overwhelming and yes tiring so thanks you forum for suggesting we do the Pitti Palace and Bobili Gardens on a different day. Beautiful Piazza's. Sant’Ambrogio very cool.
Siena: Beautiful, loved the view from the Torre del Mangia. Did the RS Audio, very good. My husband thought 2 nights was too many but 1 night anywhere seems a waste. Maybe we should have included a winery tour? The side streets were quaint and full of shops and restaurants.
Rome: Probably the biggest surprise for me (other than seeing Rick Steve's) was that I loved Rome!! Definitely had to navigate to NOT to get run over by cars/bike/scooters. RS audio tour was great, Walks of Italy tours of colosseum, Roman Forum and Palatine Hill, Sistine Chapel, Basilica and museums we all good, however, by this time we were on " Michelangelo overload" (If I could have $1.00 every time I heard the name Michelangelo) We had seen so much art, architecture and listened to so much history it became kind of a blurr, but well worth the attention. What I love the most was the beautiful Piazza's, big and small, the back streets, Trastevere, We would just wander around, having wine/beer outside, people watching and relaxing. Yes, we relaxed in Rome. We also did a great walk along the Appian Way saw the Catacombs and even found our way to a stable hoping to take a horseback ride (evidently it's important to make reservations, oh well)

Food
Surprised how cheap meals with drinks were. Every meal was good. We did a little research on dinner restaurants before we went out but the focus was really on being sure we got to experience as many areas of the cities as possible.
Hotels
Mostly small boutique hotels, very modern interior, comfortable king beds and extremely accommodating personnel. We arrived early at 3 hotels and our room was ready. One hotel offered us coffee and cake while we waited 20 minutes on the terrace. In Florence we dropped and bags and did the RS audio tour and came back to check in. I'm not a big breakfast person but all the hotels had wonderful spreads and of course great coffee. Perfect timing for everything. I must mention that I got bed bug bites, not sure what hotel but it can happen anywhere (and does) I notified the hotels for their information. Thank you Forum! Sharon