I will be in Italy for 18 days starting may 4th. I am planning to stay in Rome my first three days and then go to The Cinque Terre for three days with a one day stop along the way in Lucca. Then two days in Venice and two in Florence before spending the remaining time in Tuscany. I'd like to see Siena, San Gimignano, Volterra, Orvieto, and some other charming hill towns in Tuscany. For those of you who have been there, does this seem like a good itinerary? Any suggestions as to other hill towns? I plan to rent a car upon leaving Siena for 3-5 days and then dropping it off in Orvieto. Please help.
Posted by
US Pacific Northwest
10344 posts
Dennis: Here's the link to the replies to your Tuscany hill towns question from one year ago, didn't know if you still had those:http://www.ricksteves.com/graffiti/helpline/index.cfm?topic=8989Just curious: Were you planning to go in 2008 and then postponed it, or what?Here's another link:http://www.ricksteves.com/graffiti/helpline/index.cfm?topic=12096You can find more discussions here of Tuscany hill towns by searching on "Tuscany hill towns" or similar terms.About your 2 days allotted for Venice, it's a 6 to 7 hour train ride from the CT to Venice; that's the station to station time, when you add the time to pack up, check out of the hotel, get to the departure train station, wait for the train, and then the same time consuming drill on the other end in Venice, it basically eats up one day to get from your CT hotel to your Venice hotel--didn't know if that was factored into your 2 days for Venice.
Posted by
525 posts
Dennis, It's been two years since we went to Italy but..after making our B&B's reservations, I started looking at the train schedules. We first planned, Rome, Venice, CT, Florence and Tuscany/Umbria areas.We found it would take all day and several trains with that route going to CT after Venice. We changed to go: Rome, Venice, Florence then to CT and picked the car up in LaSpezia after our stay in the CT to tour for a week and dropped the car off at Orvieto where we stayed for several days. It worked out quite well. Even with a car it takes a while to get to the Tuscan hilltowns. I hope you have a wonderful holiday experience.
Posted by
Los Angeles, CA, USA
1449 posts
for your time in Tuscany & Umbria I'd suggest picking one town to stay in and driving to the rest as day trips. Its a lot easier than packing up to move every day or two.