Rick's suggested 21-day trip

Hi Chris,

I haven’t followed the book’s itinerary to the letter, but I’ve travelled Italy extensively, lived there for a time, and now plan trips exclusively in Italy for clients, so I hope my honest opinion is useful: this itinerary sounds exhausting.

It has ten different bases in 21 nights, and from Siena onwards you’re changing hotels almost every day (Siena, Assisi, Orvieto, Sorrento). Every move is half a day of packing, checking out, getting to the station and finding your feet again. You’d see a lot of Italy, but you’d spend most of it on trains and in hotel lobbies. So yes, I think you’d feel rushed, and what's more, I worry you'd come home exhausted, and not really feeling like you've SEEN Italy.

On your three one-night stops:

Milan: in Rick’s version, Milan is a day trip from Varenna rather than an overnight, and that works well. One day covers the Duomo (go up on the roof), the Galleria and The Last Supper (book it as early as you possibly can, as tickets sell out weeks ahead). I wouldn’t add a night here.

Assisi: if it’s staying in, give it two nights. One night means arriving in the afternoon and leaving the next morning, which misses the best of it (quiet evenings once the day-trippers leave, and the Basilica of St Francis early in the morning before they arrive). Two nights, or none, is better than one.

Orvieto: lovely, but honestly the most “optional” stop on the list. If you’re trimming, this is where I’d start.

Where I’d put the time instead: Venice and Florence both get only two nights in Rick's version, and these are two places that should be savoured, not rushed. Venice is magical, and Florence (easily my favourite place on the planet) has enough to see and do to fill a week on its own. Siena makes an easy day trip from Florence by bus or train and that's enough to see it, which you definitely should. I also know a phenomenal walking tour guide in Siena, whose details I'm happy to share if they're of interest.

I’d also think carefully about the Dolomites. They’re stunning, but unless you love the mountains or are going specifically to hike or ski, they’re a long detour on a first trip around Italy.

If you can bear to drop a few stops, something like this would be far more relaxed, in my opinion (21 nights, six bases):

Lake Garda or Lake Como: 3 nights (Garda sits right on the main Milan to Venice railway line, which makes it an easy fit on the way to Venice... stay on the west shore or the north side).
Venice: 4 nights
Cinque Terre: 3 nights
Florence: 5 nights, with Siena (and Lucca or Pisa, if you like) as day trips
Sorrento: 3 nights, with Pompeii and the Amalfi Coast as day trips
Rome: 3 nights

If Assisi is close to your heart, you could take a night or two from Florence and slot it in between Florence and Rome.

On trains: a train-based trip works beautifully in Italy, and fewer moves makes it even easier. Just know that several hill towns (Assisi and Orvieto included) have their stations down in the valley, so allow time for a bus or funicular up. Travel as light as you can: cobbles, steps and station stairs are far kinder with a small bag.

Whatever you decide, you’ve picked some of the most beautiful places in the world. But I recommend slowing down where you can.

Nesse

I’ve been to all of those places but over multiple trips. If you intend to do it in one trip, it would be too exhausting for my taste, especially without the use of cars, which would be helpful to have in some portions of the trip.

Remember that two nights in one place is just one full day in that place (plus maybe a few hours on the day of arrival.

I don’t care much for Milan, but that is me. If you want to see it properly, then you need two nights.

The Dolomites would require at least 3 nights, in my opinion, and a car would be useful. Without a car and with only 2 nights, you should stay in the Val Gardena (Ortisei, is the main town), instead of Kastelruth. Ortisei is a great hub which is well served by buses. I know Rick loves Kastelruth, but his tours use tour buses. Since you won’t have those at your disposal, but must rely on public transportation, Ortisei is a better option (and frankly I like it better than Kastelruth).
Venice in two nights is rushed if you want to see the lagoon islands (Murano, Burano, Torcello), but if you do just Venice, then it will do.
Florence is also rushed in 2 nights. One way to maximize time could be to stay in Florence for longer and visit Siena from there on a day trip (75 min by bus). That would save the time necessary for checking out and in again in two separate hotels in both Florence and Siena. The trip from Florence to Assisi is also much faster than from Siena if you don’t have a car.
I don’t like 1 nighters either, so if you can stay 2 nights in Assisi and Orvieto it is better.
The rest of the night allocations in the suggested Rick itinerary is rushed but doable.

Agree with the sentiment of the others that it is too much, too fast. Guidebook authors tend to have what is called "the curse of knowledge". Rick and Cameron have been to all the places on the 21-day itinerary many times and so while the schedule would be fast even for them, they could probably do it and have a decent time. For the first timer much less so. They'd spend as much time on the trains as you, but once they arrive they know how to find their way to the various sights and their way around inside. The first timer is going to find it much more difficult and stressful, city after city.

I've been to all the places in the itinerary at https://www.ricksteves.com/europe/italy/itinerary over multiple trips that added up to much more than 21/24 days. If I think back on those trips and try to turn them into a 3-week burst it would have been more exhausting than memorable.

Take the 24 days, cut out half the destinations, and have an enjoyable trip with time for serendipity and and time to simply soak it all in.

Agree with everything Nesse says above - very good advice there.

And of course Roberto is always right.

I would simply add this caveat for the provided Rick Steves 21-day recommended itinerary...

Rick has been in the business a long time. He has put out countless suggestions over the years, and most of it was spot-on when it was posted, and most of it has aged well. In the case of this proposed Italy itinerary, I think the advice has aged a bit - as most of us have. Yes, for 21 days, it's awfully fast-paced. 25 years ago (when I suspect this itinerary was probably posted), I might have tried to do it as described - and it would have kicked my arse. I might have been able to pull it off, but at the end I would be a wreck (like some other things I used to try - and do - 25 years ago).

Nowadays, I'd spew coffee on my monitor if I started contemplating doing that itinerary in 21 days (and my spouse would divorce me if I tried dragging her through it). If you're young, and you can (and want to) sustain that kind of blitz pace for 3 weeks, then go ahead, knock yourself out, it's possible to do it as described. But having dragged myself and my spouse through itineraries like the one provided, I have learned (and re-learned) the lesson to slow the flock down, pace myself, and enjoy the places I'm blowing through. At least I try.

So yeah, you could attempt this as provided, and you probably could get through it, but if you are like most of us, after a few days, it would begin to wear you down...and after a week or two, you may be grouchy, unmotivated, and grumbling unflattering things about Italy, Mr Steves and your travel companions, and unwilling to cross the street to look at the Sistine Chapel ("What, another church? Meh!").

So it's your choice. Go full blitz as soon as your plane lands, go balls-to-the-wall every day - get up early, charge out the door, move fast and hope you don't break things. Or slow down a bit, savor the experiences, and come home with a smile and a hunger to go back and see/do more.

The itinerary choices that Nesse posted would be a MUCH better one for me and many of us who have graduated from the bleeding blitz style of travel. But ultimately it's just a choice that you get to make.

Hi Chris. You've been to Europe before, right? What's your own preferred pace? How quickly do you get oriented to each new city? Do you want to explore and experience a place or just hit a couple of highlights and move on?

I opened my latest RS Italy book (2016 edition) and I assume the itinerary hasn't changed much. I checked my Italy shelf and found the 2006 edition, basically the identical itinerary. However European tourism has increased exponentially. 20 years ago, you could visit the Cinque Terre in shoulder season and find yourself alone on the most popular trails. There were only a handful of sights in all of Italy that needed to be booked in advance. Caveat: RS guide books mostly cover the places that RS tours visit. For the rest, you'll need other resources . . . like this Forum :-)

Here are my personal opinions.

Milan Nice enough but skippable. I saw everything I wanted and more in about 3 days on my first trip to Italy 18 years ago, including the roof of the Duomo, a tour of La Scala and the better part of a day at Sforza castle/museums. Couldn't get a ticket for the Last Supper. Never wanted to spend more time in the city, though I've flown into Milan on at least 2 other visits, and promptly got on a train out.
Varenna I haven't been to any of the lakes. Como is probably too touristy and if a lake is a priority, maybe choose a different one. Crater Lake and Canadian Rockies lakes are surely not less beautiful than any in Italy. The Dolomites are an outlier. Too much travel time for too little enjoyment time.

Now that I've cut all that, you can fly into Venice which has become my favorite city in the world after Paris. It's the best place to start your trip. Get over jetlag and absorb the atmosphere (go in off-season). Wander the back lanes and tiny canals (rios), drink lots of Aperol spritzes with cichetti, dine on the best pizza in Italy. Ride the vaporetto all along the Grand Canal, at least once during the day and once at night. Go out an hour before sunrise when it's still misty and mysterious, watch the sunrise over the lagoon from Piazza San Marco. 2 full days minimum. On to Florence where you can see the highlights in a day and a half, but if you are a fan of Renaissance painting, sculpture and architecture, you'll want at least twice that long.

Here's where you have choices. The Cinque Terre are very scenic on a sunny day, especially on a boat toward late afternoon with the sun at your back. But they have become a mecca for cruise ships. I don't know if there's any recommended time to visit. When the weather's good and ferries are running, you can usually count on having at least one ship in port. The rest of the year - trails may be closed, if it rains there's nothing to do. There are less crowded places along the Italian riviera, so if that's a priority, look into it. I enjoyed Siena, Assisi and Orvieto. These are places you can enjoy with one full day, by which I mean 2-night stays. I visited Siena as a day trip from Florence.

Naples and Sorrento in 3 days is too little time. There are high-speed trains on the Venice-Florence-Rome-Naples-Salerno route. Sorrento is a logistical outlier because it's not well connected to anywhere est. It is a very pretty resort town with views, a few good restaurants but no "sights." If you want to visit Capri and the ruins of Pompeii and Herculaneum, it's a suitable base. If you want to see the Amalfi Coast and Paestum Salerno is a much better base. You can get to Pompeii. The AC is very scenic, and there are places to sightsee in the villages. Salerno has a well-preserved historic center, a large sandy beach, a seaside promenade, easy ferry and bus access to the AC and any number of good restaurants at very reasonable prices. Highly recommended.

Hi Chris, I’ve been to Italy a lot, including staying in all of those locations. And I move much faster than most on this forum, actually favoring multiple 1-night & 2-night stops when I’m traveling solo. So, that prelude hopefully gives you an idea of my sincerity in saying this: I would never recommend that itinerary by train. It’s a “How to Hate Venice, etc. in 21 days” type itinerary.

If you really want to get a sampler, do the 17-day RS tour. They do a fantastic job getting you places that take longer by public transportation (Dolomites, Cinque Terre) & having your activity reservations lined up to quickly get into sites. Fly into Venice a few days early & stay in Verona two nights & an extra couple of days pre-tour in Venice. And stay a few extra in Rome at the end.

Otherwise, I highly recommend looking up each location on the Trenitalia train website (download the easy app for your travel). Look up the time between locations. For instance, Ortesei to Venezia S. Lucia is a 1-hr bus from Ortesei to Bolzano & then trains for four hours. The “two days in Venice” is a late afternoon and one day amount of time. Venice deserves much more.

Chris,

Here’s an itinerary where I brought my adult daughter. It was very quick moving & just 15 days. I would suggest adding several extra days in Florence, so you could go to Siena, take a mini-van tour of some Tuscany villages, etc. When you look up these train times, you will notice that most of them allowed us to be leaving off our suitcase by 10:00 or 11:00am at the next location to maximize our time. For instance, it’s just an hour from Venice to Ferrara. Hope that helps give you some hints. : )

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/mother-adult-daughter-italy-trip-aug-sept-2022

The Dolomites are an outlier. Too much travel time for too little enjoyment time.

I concur.

I did the 17 Day Italy trip and while the Dolomites are nice, the time spent there would have been much better spent somewhere else ( especially Venice, Florence, Rome).

When is this trip? Time of year?
Who is traveling- just you solo?

What are your interests? History, art, architecture, food, wine, nature, hiking, shopping? etc- that would help us give you more specific advice.

I agree with all above- this itinerary is too fast paced, too many location changes. For me it would be very exhausting and very unsatisfying. It’s just not enough time anywhere and far too much time spent getting to and from.
11 location changes over 21 nights means you are packing up, checking out, traveling, checking in, unpacking, getting oriented etc almost every other day. Each location change eats up at least a half a day so you would spend at least 5 days worth of your trip in transit.
TBH- all of RS suggested itineraries remind me of that old movie “If its Tuesday, This Must be Belgium”

The suggested itineraries are very good as a starting point, use as a framework and plan your own trip.
I would first eliminate all the outliers- Milan/Como, Dolomites, Assisi and Amalfi Coast.

Pick 3 major locations- Venice, Florence, Rome- for example- (no rule that you have to do those 3 but it is the classic Italy trip).
Use the RS guide book and make lists for all the things you want to see and do in those 3 larger cities- that will tell you how many nights you need in each location. Be brutally honest how much you can do each day- if it is summer keep the heat and crowds in mind. There will be crowds almost everywhere anytime of the year.
Give yourself time to linger, wander, visit a market, sit in a piazza with a spritz- that’s how you enjoy Italy- not racing from site to site checking things off a list.

Typically Venice 3, Florence, 3, Rome 4 is a good start. For Florence add 1 night for every day trip you want to take.

Then pick 3-4 “minor” locations and slot them in between the big cities/crowds to give yourself a bit of a break/quieter experience

I would probably pick just 1 water location- either a lake or CT. Just know that CT is extremely overcrowded and a bit of a pain to get to. Use Trenitalia website and Google Maps to see how transportation works.

There are also places that RS doesn’t mention at all that may interest you. Bologna comes to mind- (foodie capital plus close to car factories, less touristed as well, close to Ravenna and Ferrara)

Get some different guide books and use this forum- there is a wealth on info here. Use the search function-filter by Date.
Watch youtube videos of places that intrerest you

Just a suggestion as I don’t know your interests.

Fly into Venice- easier to fly IN to than out of, great place to get over jet lag.

3 nights in Venice is enough for the major sites and a vaporetto ride out to the lagoon islands.

Train to next stop- consider Verona or Bologna both have great day trip opportunities-if you want day trips give this location 3 nights
Or Lake Garda

Train to CT- give it 3 nights to make it worth the hassle, it will take a good part of the day just too get there

Train to Florence- 3 nights minimum
Add 1 night for each day trip- Siena or Lucca/Pisa or a guided bus tour of Tuscany hill towns
So let’s say 5 nights in Florence

Train to Orvieto- it is lovely and a really nice break, Easy to access right on the train line- 2 nights
(If Assisi is important than substitute for Orvieto)

Train to Rome- give Rome all the time you can- 4-5 nights if possible.

Fly home from Rome

Save AC, south of Rome for another trip - you can combine with Puglia

So many forum vets here, including Christine & Chani, know their stuff. But it's so personal...and you don't know until you get there. So hear out everyone.

Let's take you at your word and say 24 nights. You can do a lot, but not everything! Let's also pick a time for you--since you haven't provided that. Myself, I would rather not go than travel to Italy May through September. Especially since Covid, saying Italy is busy is an understatement. Throngs of people and sometimes gridlock in many of the popular areas. My favorite months to travel are March and November--depending on where, still temperate but not as tourist-laden. I'm also assuming you won't be driving, good choice!

What I'd do, and this next March it'll be my 5th trip:

Fly into Milan, train to Verona, 2 nights. (Daytrip to Como, etc.)
Train to Florence, 5 nights. (Daytrips to Chianti, Tuscany)
Train Florence to Orvieto, 2 nights
Train Orvieto to Rome, 7 nights (my favorite city, explore!)
Train Rome to Salerno, 3 nights (daytrip to Paestum)
Train to Sorrento, 5 nights (daytrips to Amalfi Coast, Naples, Pompeii)
Train to Naples airport, fly home.

Without getting into specifics, I think that's a fairly sane pace, a good mix of hotels and maybe AirBnB's (Florence, Rome, Sorrento). You can do a deeper dive into those three areas as well. And all along the train routes.

Enjoy your planning!

If this is your first trip to Italy, and you’re planning on making subsequent trips, I don’t see the purpose of rushing through cities and towns or spending an entire day traveling to outlier locations.

I would do something like this:

• Venice 4/5 nights
• Florence 4/5
• Siena 2/3
• Assisi 2/3
• Orvieto 2
• Rome 5/6

You get to experience the big three, along with three other towns that have great sights and are great for just wandering around.

Hi, its me again, Chris, circling back...

thank you each and every one of you for your responses and suggestions.

For background, we like history, food, art and buildings, plus easy walks/hikes. Our trip will be early-mid May 2027. I am thinking that for my wife and I (ages 60 and 65), that completing the RS 21-day Italy blitz would be too much. Better to focus on a few regions, with longer stays in each, knowing that we will be back.

With your inputs, I am thinking that Rome, Venice, Florence, plus a couple adjacent regions would offer the best plan for our first trip in Italy. I'll keep you posted on what I come up with...

thanks again,
Chris

Any of the suggestions offered in this thread would make for a far, far better trip than the 21-day blitz Rick lays out--assuming you don't know for sure this will be your only trip to Italy. (And even then, I'd prefer the other options.) I like to be sure I have enough time at each stop to absorb the atmosphere as well as see all the sights of significant importance to me.

Having ended up splitting both France and Spain into two separate trips (east/west or north/south) totaling 4+ months each, I'd suggest you also consider making next year's trip northern Italy rather than all of Italy. You can define "northern Italy" as you like, either including or excluding Rome. As someone who likes dozens of places in Italy, I'd tend to leave Rome for a second trip, but I know that's hard to do.

Just a couple of specific comments about destinations mentioned above:

• Milan is a very good location for people interested in art and in Art Nouveau architecture.

• Verona is a very attractive city and a nice break from the Big 3, but it is not a good base for a day trip to Lake Como; it could work for Lake Garda, I think. If you want to take a day trip to Lake Como, that should be done from Milan. I like the idea of a few days (not just one) at one of the lakes, but I think that works better as a mid-trip break rather than as the first stop.

My wife and I did a RS paced self tour of Italy 25 years ago and loved it! Now that we are older, we’d follow the advice given here — and what you’ve chosen! (Our kids would definitely follow his pacing though!)

Happy travels! You’ll have a great time!

Fly into Milan, train to Verona, 2 nights. (Daytrip to Como, etc.)

I am guessing you meant to type "day trip to Garda" but honestly with only a 2 night stay there is no time for that.
Won't get to Verona til late afternoon probably then have just 1 full day.
You would want at least 3 nights in Verona to do a day trip anywhere.

This is my minimum nights allocations for the locations suggested by RS in his 21 day itinerary. As stated above, understand that 2 nights in a place is one full day in that place (place a few hours on the day of arrival). Minimize hotel changes when you can, in the time necessary to switch hotels (pack, check out, travel with luggage to new hotel, check in, unpack) you can take a day trip to a place 90 min away.

Milan: if you care to see it, I'd give it 2 nights. 1 night could be ok, if you don't care much about it and your flight arrives early in the morning.
Lake Como (Varenna or Bellagio or Menaggio): I like 3 nights in this area, but 2 would be the bare minimum.
Dolomites (I recommend Ortisei withou a car): 3 nights minimum
Venice: 3 nights minimum (Murano and Burano can be visited while there)
Cinque Terre: 2 nights should do, but it has become a zoo, so be forewarned.
Florence: 4-5 nights (with one day trip to Siena by bus or train, and/or one day trip to Lucca+Pisa by train). Florence alone needs two full days to see the highlights.
Assisi: 2 nights is enough as you need a day to visit, but it's too far from everything else for a day trip from somewhere else.
Orvieto: As for Assisi 2 nights is enough since it can be seen in a day, however it's only 70 min from Rome by train, so you could potentially take a full day trip here, while you are staying in Rome. Also you could visit it en route to Rome (there is a luggage storage at the station).
Naples area (Sorrento, Amalfi Coast, Capri, Naples, Pompeii, etc.): 4-5 nights is the minimum I'd spend here. Sorrento is a good base. Salerno may be another option, especially to see the Amalfi Coast and Paestum. You can spend a lot more time in this area and not regret it, there is a lot to see.
Rome: 4 nights minimum. You could possibly utilize a day to take a day trip to Orvieto, but of course that would take away time from Rome itself, which certainly deserves a full 3 days to visit.

I think people here have offered a lot really solid advice and planning tips. I guess I would just add that Rick's 21 day plan seems to me to be the sampler platter of as much of Italy as you can stand. It takes you from the west to the east, from north to (sort of) south, has big cities, lakes, mountains, little towns, multiple coastal locations, it slices, it dices, and even cleans your floors! If you really wanted to see much of what Italy has to offer in a very short period of time, as a way of deciding what to come back and see on further trips this isn't a bad way to go. However, if you know what you are interested in and your traveling style it is just a blueprint to filter things out and extract what you feel is most interesting a way and a pace that you feel comfortable with.

I remember years ago arguing with someone who trying to go everything on the Spain agenda and he was struggling to fit a side trip to Gibraltar into his schedule. I was trying to tell him Gibraltar had nothing to do with Spain and it was the easiest thing to edit out to solve his timing issues. "But I'm following Rick's itinerary" was his repeated response.

Everyone's input into your trip - even Rick's - is just informed advice and I'm sure Rick would say the same thing. It's your trip and no one here is going to take it with you or can tell you you're doing it wrong.

Have a great trip!
=Tod

With your inputs, I am thinking that Rome, Venice, Florence, plus a
couple adjacent regions would offer the best plan for our first trip
in Italy.

I think that's a wise decision, Chris, and I'll also agree with Roberto's suggested minimum days for the various locations. Rick's 21-day itinerary would exhaust my husband and myself in a fat hurry! Besides, it can sometimes take a bit of time to acclimate to the layout of an unfamiliar place and how things, like local transport, work.

I'll mention another good reason for giving some of the locations (Venice, Florence, Rome, Naples//AC) more time is that you'll have more flexibility when working around closure days/limited visiting hours for attractions which have those, and possibly some weather complications as well. :O)