Please sign in to post.

Italy Itinerary Review/Help

Posted by (St. Louis, MO, USA) on

I previously posted an itinerary for Italy and Croatia. We decided it was too ambitious given that we will be traveling with young children. Our updated itinerary is primary Italy with a start in Switzerland. We have purchased tickets in to Geneva and out of Milan. We will be traveling with grandparents (so will have help for kiddos). I am going to post our preliminary itinerary and have some detail questions about the order.

Arrive Geneva (9-17), train to Murren, 3 nights
Stresa, 1 night (this is primarily to break up the train ride for the toddler)
Florence, 4 nights (day trip to Lucca on way to CT)
CT, 3 nights
Tuscany, 4 nights
Milan, 1 night

Question:
- I have 1 more day, any suggestions on what to do with it?
- I originally chose this itinerary order in order to put a shorter stay (CT) between longer stays (Florence and Tuscany). But I realize this also creates some backtracking. Would you suggest doing Florence, Tuscany, then CT?
- We plan to have a car only for the Tuscany portion.

Would love your thoughts

Jesse

Posted by
11834 posts

I like the flow. You can rent your car in La Spezia as you leave the Cinque Terre and return it wherever convenient then take the train to Milan. I would add the night to somewhere you are already staying and not add another one night stop. Tuscany could be 5 nights and Milan could certainly be 2, but my favorite would be Muerren. You’ll love it!

Posted by
4105 posts

Or you could do Florence>Tuscany>Lucca> CT> Milan.

Posted by
229 posts

That would put us in CT in early October, which I assume is better for crowds?

Posted by
28435 posts

Or you could add a night in Stresa to see the Borromean Islands.

Posted by
11669 posts

Definitely add the extra night to Stresa on Lake Maggiore. There is nice promenade along the lakefront where the kids can run and get traveling out of their systems. The Borromean Islands are a nice place to visit too.

Posted by
21274 posts

You might consider flying into Zurich rather than Geneva. It is 3 1/4 hours to Muerren vs 4 hours from Geneva. As far as picking flights, United can do it just a single plan change, and I'd go with Washington Dulles rather than ORD. A lot of flights from ORD code share with Swiss, a great airline but you have to transfer from the United terminal to the International terminal, which is a bit of a pain.

Delta requires 2 changes, and one is often at CDG, an airport to be avoided, or JFK. Pick Amsterdam if you have to use Delta.

Posted by
229 posts

We actually tried for Zurich but found an amazing deal/flight plan through Air Canada. $579 per ticket with only one change in Toronto. We were pretty excited - it is hard to find good flights out of STL.

You know I originally chose Stresa just because it was the most beautiful stop alone the route from Interlaken to Florence, but maybe I should consider an extra night there. I will do some more reading about the places you mentioned.

This topic has been automatically closed due to a period of inactivity.