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Driving in Italy, what to bring to navigate Tuscany and Central Italy

This is my second time to Italy but first time driving there.

Planning on picking up the car in La Spezia after staying a few days in the Cinque Terre then driving down the coast by passing Pisa and staying in Volterra ( 2 nights) and then exploring the RS driving thru tuscany part of the RS Italy Guide book by passing Siena and ending up in Montepulciano (2 nights) and then the final night in Ostia on the coast near the Rome Airport where we will drop off the car and fly out.
Based on web research I plan on bringing my iPhone for talking google maps navigator, my Garmin NUVI 2595 LMT car GPS navigator I got for christmas a few years ago , and paper driving maps from the Touring Club Italiano Road maps for Tuscana and Central Italy.
I generally like to have paper maps around just to get an over all idea with where I am and where I am going since I like to have a visual . These should help with the ZTA cameras also.
Any other advice would be more than welcome ! Has anyone used a Garmin in Italy and does it work ok?

thanks,
Liam

Posted by
16209 posts

I used Garmin with European Maps loaded in it and it works. Now it’s kind of old and half malfunctioning, so I use it only for the time necessary from the airport to the hotel, if I land and go to a hotel in an unfamiliar area. Because as soon as I can, I buy an Italian SIM card for my iPhone and from then on, I use google maps or Waze on. Y phone. I like Google Maps, but Waze warns you of speed cameras, which is a nice feature in Italy where there are about 30 or 40,000 of those. If you plan to use your iPhone from the get go, make sure you inquire into data charges overseas from your provider. If necessary purchase an international plan. The Italian plans for tourists are 30€ for a month, 4Gb with TIM, or 2Gb with Vodafone (which includes also hubpndred of international voice minutes and texts). If you buy an Italian plan, be aware that your phone will have a brand new Italian number. If you plan to use your phone from the start do you need a Garmin? Probably not. The phone works beautifully.
Paper maps are a good idea for planning, although they tend to show only the main roads. Italy is a country with way too many roads, and although paved, only with Google maps you can zoom to that level of that detail. Paper maps can’t, unless they are for a very small area.

Posted by
15798 posts

I used my Garmin Nuvi 2559LMT (bought in mid-2016) a year ago in southern Italy, Amalfi Coast area. It was pretty good though there were a couple of places it didn't recognize. With a phone, Waze is probably best, since it's interactive . . . everyone here swears by it and we were the first to use it, so we've had the most experience with it.

Posted by
3303 posts

In the past I’ve used my Garmin that I purchased about 12 years ago. It came with North American and European Maps which I can still update. For the last four years, I’ve relied solely on my iPhone for navigation. If you know that cell service may be spotty in certain areas, you can download maps in Google Maps for off line use. Your phone will switch seamlessly from on to off to on line whenever necessary. (Just download the portions of the map where you’ll be driving and not the whole map of Italy.) there’s really no reason to bring your GPS. On my latest trip I used WAZE and liked it better than Maps. It is more connected to current traffic conditions. My last two auto rentals in Europe were Ford Focus and it has a USB port that integrates with the vehicle’s audio system, gives turn by turn directions, warns about traffic cams and traffic tutor zones and keeps the phone charged. Neither Garmin nor WAZE warns about ZTL’s.

Here’s a link to a website with maps of any cities with ZTL’s. There’s a complete list of regions and cities if you scroll down the page.

Posted by
438 posts

They warn you about speed cameras with signs with words like velocità and electronics (I'll let Roberto fill in with more detail), so as long as you pay attention you should be fine. Google's italian pronunciation is worse than mine and small towns don't always have road names well signed. That paper map would be good for making a list of towns you'll be going through, and then follow the signs that direct you to those towns. I found that to be easier than gps.

Posted by
6 posts

We always travel with a Tep wifi hotspot (rented from online) and use google maps. We drive in Tuscany every year and have never had any issues. We have found that if your rental car has GPS it will signal when a speed camera is coming up, even if you are not using it to navigate.

Posted by
1829 posts

Used a rental wifi hotspot in combination with a free App called WAZE on my phone and it was perfect
Speed camera advance warnings included as well as telling you the speed you needed to be under as each approached, traffic tudor system warnings on the highways and real time traffic was spot on.

Did not alert me of any ZTL zones or their cameras, but not sure anything offers you that.

Also traveled through Tuscany with one of those Garmin units with European Maps preloaded, I never plugged it in once, seemed like very old tech compared to Waze. So much so that I left it in the glove box of the rental car, felt no need to travel back home with it since I will never use it.

Having a printed paper map as a backup is a good plan, I only had preprinted Google Maps directions as my backup.
Never needed them but felt comfortable having something just for general direction guidance ; don't think a better quality map I would have found anymore useful.

We drove from Florence to Pienza, stopped in Siena, all around Val D'Orcia while staying in Pienza, then drove to Manarola in the CT and then from there up to the Dolomites with a stop in Verona along the way before driving all around the Dolomites while based in Ortisei ; then lastly dropping the car off in Venice and always had solid coverage.

Posted by
16 posts

Liam, we just did a lot of driving throughout Italy this past summer. I bought a new Garmin Nuvi, sorry can’t remember the model, with Euro maps already in there. It worked flawlessly. Couldn’t have been happier with it.
Gary