Trying to plan first trip to Italy in Sept 2017. Have flights booked already, now the hard part, planning how long to stay in one location and travel between locations. We arrive in Rome on the 23rd of Sept. at 9:45am and would love to either stay in Rome or go directly to Sorrento and stay there a few days, then back to Rome for a few days and from there to somewhere in Tuscany, a few suggestions from others have been either Lucca or Cinque Terre. Would like to stay here for at least three days since we can do day trips to Florence, Pisa and Siena and relax. Then final leg would be from there to Venice where we fly home on the 2nd of October at noon. So I would love itinerary suggestions. Is traveling at night the best to get the full day in each area or when is? Planning to sue trains when possible. Also best places to stay, hotels, apartments or B&B's. There will be four of us traveling. HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by
Brisbane, Australia
7175 posts
Realistically you need at least 5-6 additional nights if you want to include Sorrento and Cinque Terre.
23 Sep - Arrive Rome - 3 nights
24,25 Sep - Rome sights
26 Sep - am train to Florence - 3 nights
26 Sep - pm excursion to Pisa
27 Sep - Florence sights
28 Sep - Excursion to Lucca or Siena
29 Sep - am in Florence
29 Sep - pm train to Venice - 3 nights
30, 01 Oct - Venice sights
02 Oct - Depart Venice
Posted by
Centennial, CO
53 posts
When we first started traveling in Europe, I always found in planning that my inital itinerary was too agressive and not terribly realistic. Rick Steve's guide books give suggested itineraries by the number of days you will be in country. Don't count your first or last day. For the number of days you have- Rome, Florence, Venice is appropriate. So the previous response was right on. I would even limit excursions from Florence to one; Florence has a lot to offer. In order to relax, slow down a bit.
P.S. If you don't already own a RS Italy guide book, get one. We have used these little gems faithfully for 8 wonderful trips...working on #9. Enjoy!
Posted by
Toledo, Ohio, US
11613 posts
Traveling at night: not my favorite. Buses probably won't be running, there are no night trains for your trip because the fast trains take do little time. Your longest travel times will be getting to/from Cinque Terre (not a good base for daytrips, by the way), and that could take six hours with multiple connections.
Whether you choose hotels, apartments, or B&Bs depends on your tastes. Apartments will put the four of you in very close proximity, a hotel will give you 24/7 front desk access and advice in many cases. I prefer hotels and B&Bs, even when traveling with friends, over apartments. Your call, though.
Posted by
Portland
3648 posts
With just 9 days, Rome, Venice and Florence are enough to more than fill your time. Moving around sucks up time and energy and should be kept to a minimum. With those 3 cities as bases you could do some terrific day trips; but, honestly, you hardly have time enough to do those cities justice.
Posted by
Tel Aviv
15798 posts
You have 9 nights, and 8.5 days. At best, you only get to your Rome hotel at noon, and you'll want to freshen up and have lunch. So you have 1/2 day to wander the city, probably in a daze. 2 more days for Rome, then 3 in Florence with your day trips, leaves you 2 days in Venice. You will have to leave your hotel early on Oct 2 to get to the airport in time for your flight.
I don't see how you fit in anywhere else. You can certainly take an evening train from Rome to Florence. You have to start by picking up your luggage at your hotel and going to the train station. Pick up some food and a bottle of wine at a deli or a supermarket and have a picnic supper on the train. Note that you'll lose some time getting to Florence and to Venice. I don't recommend arriving in Venice after dark. It's hard enough to find your way around in daylight. Even if you take the 8.30 am train from Florence, it's going to be close to noon by the time you drop your bags at your Venetian hotel.
Many people recommend combining Pisa and Lucca in one day trip from Florence.
Posted by
Minnesota 🎒
16748 posts
I'm afraid I'm in the same camp as the others that with only 9 nights/ and less than 8.5 days to realistically work with - subtracting time for moves - you're going to have to drop some things. The three large cities on your list all have enough to fill the time that you have with no day trips at all. Even if you split the number of nights evenly between them, 3 nights is a bare minimum for Rome - there's a lot to see there - and I'd say the same for Florence. Trying to plan 1 day in this many cities will eat up a lot of time moving around and leave too little for sightseeing itself.
Sorrento is an outlier involving backtracking, and the CT is not a good base for taking day trips: it would take too much time to get to the places you list plus you've left no time for the CT itself. I see if shaking out something like this:
23rd: arrive in Rome, get settled, have a walkabout and get your bearings
24: Rome
25: Rome
26 Rome/ late afternoon train to Florence
27 Florence
28 Florence
29 Venice (partial day)
30 Venice
1 Venice
2 Depart
You could borrow a day from Venice to add to Florence for taking a day trip, or hit just the highlights of Florence on one of your two full days and use the 2nd for a day trip.
Some things you'll need to work around are the closure of state museums on Mondays (will affect Rome), "free last-Sundays-of-the-month" at the Vatican Museums on the 24th (NOT a day to try and see those) and "free 1st-Sundays-of-the-month" at Italian state museums, which will affect Oct. 1 in Venice. I'm not sure how extraordinarily busy the best of them might be as compared to those in Rome and Florence, though.
It might help to know what you are interested in seeing in each city? That helps when figuring what sort of time each of them need.