Italy Sicily Venice Rome 16 nights

Is the Sicily town where you friends are Canicattì? Is the date when you need to be there fixed?

Asking because it would make sense for you to fly from Venice to Catania, rent a car to head to Syracuse for 3 nights, head to Canicattì for the night, then on to Palermo for 3 nights before flying out to Germany.

Canicattì is very close to Agrigento and you should visit the temples there.
Ragusa, while beautiful, can be skipped in my opinion. I suggest you add a night to Syracuse to have time for Noto instead.

Of course you can always spend more time in Sicily, but it would be a shame to take time off Rome, so I wouldn't change the length.

I would think 2 nights in Venice is at least one too few.

I agree about the time in Venice being awfully short. The trains are super-fast, but that trip up from Rome is a solid 4 hours on the train, plus time to get between hotel and train station on each end, plus hotel check-out/check-in. You're going to lose at least half the day on that transfer, leaving you only 1-1/2 days in Venice.

The fact is that Sicily needs at least 2 weeks if you have a rental car and at least a few extra days if you don't. There's nothing you can do with your schedule that will allow a good visit to see all of Sicily. Stealing time from Rome isn't going to make much difference in Sicily, and it will hurt you in Rome.

Just pick what you most want to see in Sicily and accept that you'll need to go back if you like it as much as the rest of us do. Palermo and Siracusa would be my top two choices of cities as well. Travel across the island is fairly slow; there are no fast trains to help you out. It's important to figure out your inbound and outbound flight options so you don't have to travel across the island twice. Catania is the larger airport and is convenient to Siracusa. Palermo also has a bunch of flights. See if you can fly into one city and out of the other.

I would stick to Rome and Sicily.

Added Venice amd will day trip to Belluna. Only two places in Sicily amd can say trip Cefalu? Removed Ragusa. Removed Syracuse. Half trip is visiting canacati area so agrigento near.

fly to Rome
Rome 4 nights
Train from Rome to venice
Venice 4 nights
Fly Venice to Palermo, rent car
- Palermo 4 night
- Agrigento 3 night visit friends
Return car Palermo
Fly Palermo to Munich
Train Munich to Salzberg
Salzberg 2 night
Train Salzberg to regensberg
Regenensberg 4 night
Train regensberg to kassel
Rent car
- hildesheim or Goslar 3 night
- Kassel 4 night
Train kassel to Frankfurt airport hotel

That looks reasonable to me for Sicily. You have to work with the time available.

A very good side-trip from Palermo (only takes a few hours, not all day) is to Monreale to see the cathedral, arguably Sicily's top sight. You can get there by public bus, but there are tour buses as well (more costly, of course).

For Palermo, you wrote 'rent car'. Are you staying in Palermo or outside of city? You may not need the car for that time period, depending on what you want to see. Palermo is very walkable and has good public transportation.

Cefalu is easy trip by train from Palermo. It's not really a full day timewise.

I am finally at a point where I can continue schduling the trip. We are now going to be in Sicily for 2 weeks. But, think of it as one week - because we prefer staying in places for a long time each - so 3 nights in one place is the minimum. I am looking at the schedule.

Arrive Sicily November 7. I agree with the many suggestions that Catania makes more sense to fly into.

Yes - Canicatti - we must be in on November 12 for a birthday party and November 18-21 for a birthday party. We depart Sicily on November 21.

My husband wants to see Syracuse for sure and I am interested in Ragusa.

Going that route - not sure how to fit Palermo in since we must be in Canicatti for 2 birthdays a week apart - also we want time to rest and get to know the family there - the family of our exchange student. We have known them over the phone for an entire year now.