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Central/Northern Italy Itinerary for June 2025

Posted by (Portland, OR) on

My 16YO daughter and I will be traveling to Italy June 2025, and I am looking for feedback and advice for a 10-12 day itinerary.

  • Since it is a Jubilee year, we wish to avoid Rome, and want to spend relatively little time in Florence, even though I think it might be best to arrive via FLR. I really dislike large crowds.
  • We are limiting ourselves to central/northern Italy this time. Once there, we will travel by train. I am not renting a car.
  • We are not travel warriors, and enjoy unplanned hours for nothing but people-watching, walking aimlessly and visiting food markets. We are into art and design, and food (pescatarian— so Parma is out!). It would be cool to take some no-wine foodie tours and a cooking class.


This is what I have so far:


  • PDX > VCE
  • Venice - 2 nights
  • Lake Garda - 2-3 nights (day trip to Verona) OR Verona 2-3 nights (day trip to Lake Garda)?
  • Bologna - 3 nights
  • Lucca - 3 nights (day trip to Pisa)
  • FLR > PDX (Or — Reverse fly into FLR, out of VCE?)

Would love to get your thoughts and feedback.

  • Does this order make logical sense?
  • Am I planning too many places? If so, what’s skippable or combinable?
  • I’m really putting a lot of faith that Lucca will be marvelous— otherwise, we’d just stay in Bologna longer and fly home from there, or Milan.
  • Recommended lodging? (I'm a single mom and a working artist. Three stars is plenty.)

Grazie! Thank you!

Posted by
7314 posts

What happened to your previous post?

Anyway
Fly IN to Venice-much easier than flying out of
Give Venice 3 nights
Garda or Verona 2 nights
Bologna -day trip to Ravenna-the mosaics are
fabulous -I would give Bologna 2 then add a night for every day trip

Lucca is fine for 2 nights but you’ll want 3 for the day trip to Pisa

Posted by
4 posts

Hi, ChristineH.

I deleted my previous post because I had changed my itinerary so darn much that I didn't want to waste folks' time commenting on something that wasn't even in the cards anymore. :-)

Thank you for your suggestions! I will check out Ravenna-- you had me at "mosaics"!

Posted by
1196 posts

A couple of shorthand thoughts:
- Two nights in Venice is only one day - and probably a jet lagged day at that. Unless you've seen Venice and are making an educated choice Venice deserves more time.
- Verona is a pretty, arty, chic, cafe culture kind of town. If you stay in Verona the train makes lower Lake Garda a very quick and easy visit but the lower lake is very touristy for this reason. Buses from Verona will give you access to the upper side of the lake and places like Malcesine. Given the trouble of getting to those places and the lakes slower pace of life I would choose to go all in on the lakes or Verona.
- Bologna is an easy train ride from about anywhere and is well connected. It has the oldest university in Europe and it has a funkier vibe in the University area.
- Lucca will take longer from Bologna than you want it to - probably via Florence although there is an occasional direct regionale train from Bologna to Florence. Lucca and Pisa will be crowded in June but they are interesting visits. Quieter and prettier Lucca interests slower pace tourists but Pisa has two Universities and might be of more interest to a 16yo for a younger, hipper vibe.

Venice bad for flying out of from the city because it is logistically difficult and flights to the US tend to be very early so I would choose Florence for flying out if that's an option.

Have a great trip,
=Tod

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