Please sign in to post.

North Italy June Requesting Advice on Itinerary

Posted by on

We're headed to northern Italy next month (June 17th) to hike 7 days in the Dolomites with 2 weeks open on the front end. Our primary interests are food/wine, hiking/walking. We prefer smaller towns to big cities but would like to do day tours into the city. We're looking for feedback on # of days per area along with best area to stay near Florence, Bologna, Cortina, and the Piedmont region. If this schedule is too aggressive please let us know. Thanks!

Dates Location

  1. 7/18 Arrive Venice airport, rent car and head to Bologna
  2. 7/18-20 (2 days) Bologna/Modena/Parma (not sure which place to stay in)
  3. 7/20-22 (2days) Florence/Lucca (stay in Lucca w/day trips into Florence)
  4. 7/22-26 (4 days) Cinque de Terre (stay outside and head in, or looking for lodging w/in)
  5. 7/26-30 (4 days) Piedmont wine region; not sure where to stay yet. Will do wine tours mostly and hike
  6. 7/30-1 (1 day) Stay in area closer to Cortina where our Dolomites hike starts
  7. 7/1-2 (1 day) Cortina overnight for start of our hike morning of the 2nd. We haven't figured out yet what to do w/our rental car once we get to the Dolomite area)
  8. 7/2-9 (7 days) Hike; ends in Campitello on the 9th where we will head to Venice after breakfast
  9. 7/9-10 Venice overnight- fly home
Posted by
3303 posts

I would drop 2 days from the CdeT and add a day each to your two prior stops. I stayed in Parma last year but this year it’ll be Bologna - rail service between the three cities is frequent and inexpensive and you don’t want to be driving into the city centers. Take the train and avoid the stress. My personal choice would be to stay in Florence with a day trip to Lucca.

Posted by
16206 posts

You don’t need a rental car until you leave the Cinque Terre. You can rent a car at La Spezia, next to Cinque Terre, provided its not a Sunday when rental agencies are closed.
Keep the rental for your entire stay on the Dolomites, you will need it. Return the car in Venice, the day before flying home. If you stay near the airport, return it at the airport, if you stay in the city center return it at Piazzale Roma.
For Piedmont wine region you can stay in the Langhe or Monferrato areas. The official tourism website for that area is below. Take your pick.
http://www.langheroero.it/index.jsp?idProgetto=2

Posted by
3 posts

Thank you for the replies.

Regarding the rental car if we pick it up after Cinque de Terra and head to the Dolomites is it still best keeping it (unused) while we hike? The hike starts in Cortina but is from lodging to lodging so we won't need the rental car for a 7 day period. If it makes sense to leave it in a car park near Cortina then we can do that. Just want to confirm is that would be best.

Posted by
3 posts

If we find a way to return the rental in Cortina and take the bus to Venice we would have luggage. Assuming buses can accommodate luggage but not sure. Thanks

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