Italy for a month

My wife and I, aged 71 and 70, respectively, just returned from a one-month visit before Christmas - Florence, Arezzo, Cortona and Rome. Had a wonderful time.

We'd previously visited Trieste and I loved it. Wife not so much. It is a big city and if smaller is your preference, maybe Cortona or Padua or Treviso would be a better fit.

Splitting four days between Florence and Arezzo might be shortchanging Florence.

That's early for CT depending on your preference for weather. The old city center of Verona feels smaller than its city's size and could be a nice place for a few days in the north.

Easter is April 6th so take that into account.

Have a great trip,
=Tod

Instead of Trieste, consider Piran in neighboring Slovenia for a couple of nights.

What kind of transport do you intend to use while in Trieste? Not sure of the feasibility of getting to Croatia unless you’ll have a car and then it will still be more time in a car than I would like.
Be sure to have plan B scoped out in case it’s rainy in Cinque Terre.

To hiredman's Easter note, Good Friday and Easter, on a previous visit to Cortona (at least for us) is an all-time great travel memory. Between the Good Friday march and the spectacular Easter dinner, it was amazing.

Cinque Terre is a place that is best enjoyed with warm non rainy weather, and at the end of March the weather is not settled and is generally cool or possibly cold. That time of the year is the second rainiest (after early November), so I don’t know if I would choose to stay there that long at that time of the year.

Regarding Slovenia and Croatia, there might be transportation challenges but I can’t help you there because I’ve only driven there from Italy. For sure I can tell you that as you leave the coast near Trieste or Slovenia or Croatia, as you travel to the interior, you will experience a huge drop in temperatures. It could be a perfectly nice and warm spring day in Trieste, but you could experience freezing cold just across the hill into Slovenia.

Last year, in October, we based in Triesete to explore Udine in Italy and Piran in Slovenia, but treated Triesete pretty much a place to sleep. We prior, 3 nights in Treviso, then after 3 in Venice. We had a long list of places to visit (we were visiting relics of many saints). I was pretty tired of driving around.

If I had to do it over, I would slow down and enjoy fewer places deeper.

I don't think the Dolomites are a good choice at that time of year unless you are skiers.

What cities are you flying into and out of?

I would spend at least 4 nights in Florence.

You could check the weather for Tuscany at that time of year. Wonderful places to stay in Tuscany are Lucca, Siena, and Pienza.

I would also recommend Milan if that's not too big for you. Or Parma, which is wonderful and smaller. If you spent 3 or 4 nights in Parma, you could also visit Modena as a daytrip.

Are you counting by days or nights? When you say 5 days in Rome, is that 6 nights which will give you 5 days? Or is that 5 nights, which gives you 4 days?

" five days in Dolomites, four days in Cinque Terre"

Skip the Dolomites that time of the year. Have you done Venice?

Trieste is OK, but pales compared to Venice. Also, Ravenna is great.
If you want to see Croatia go to Split and Dubrovnik.

Cinque Terre is good, but in my opinion The Amalfi Coast is better.

I agree with geovagriffith. If you haven't been to Venice, skip Trieste for Venice. Spend 4 nights in Venice. We visited for the first time last May, and Venice was one of the highlights of our trip. Venice really is like no other. Stay in Dorsoduro which is much quieter than San Marco.

You never know about weather, although I wouldn’t plan to go to the Dolomite’s in March. I have, however, been to the Cinque Terre twice in March and the weather was quite pleasant - good for hiking. Lots of people though.
Agree that Piran would be a better choice than Trieste as it is a smaller town, but Italy is full of small, charming towns, and I would focus on just staying in Italy, and plan a different trip for Slovenia and Croatia as there is much to see.

There are cheap flights from Rome to Dubrovnik. From there enjoy the city and maybe an island. You could rent a car and wind your way up the coast or fly to Zagreb then get a train to Ljubljana.

Croatia and Slovenia are really awesome. I would absolutely think they work well with Italy. The issue is whether you can accomplice a very full Italy itinerary and still add either or both. With your schedule, I'm not sure it makes sense.