Sicily and south Italy

When Rick started writing travel books, his goal was to get middle class people to go to Europe, stay in less expensive hotels and see the major sites. He's always concentrated on the "Majors" and his guide books are pretty good, especially for first timers to a country or even to Europe.

I wish he would get to Southern Italy as well, but he's gotten so very big now, that his blog offers better advice from some very experienced travellers who can answer pretty specific questions.

Also, he has a personal opinion. Rick did not like Naples years ago, and barely covered it at all, and there weren't even any hotel recommendations in his book. His old advice was to stay in Sorrento and day trip to Naples.

He now does Rick Steves Tours of Sicily, I've noticed, but he still does a broad "overview" rather than concentrating on specific areas.

I have family in the North Adriatic side of Italy in a town he says is a "waste of time" but I love it!

Lonely Planet Guidebooks can help fill in the gap, as well as National Geographics Guides, etc. I have become so accustomed to his guidebooks myself, that I'm having difficulty 'switching over' to others' formats now!

He's just been in Jerusalem, which is a big reach for him, and he Will have a political opinion to share.

Ciao Jerry and Stelly,
I agree with previous poster. Rick's guidebooks reflect his opinion of the best, most iconic sites of Italy. So many travellers have only a limited time to see Italy so he shares his suggestions for the highlights. We have taken his 17 day Italy tour and it was outstanding. After this tour we spent another two weeks seeing other places not covered by the tour (Tuscan hilltowns, Amalfi Coast etc.)and had a great time especially since we learned a lot from our guide re: public transportation etc. We hadn't planned to return to Italy as we had other places on our bucket list. When Rick says "you will return", he's absolutely right. Four years later we returned to explore Umbria's hilltowns (Assisi, Orvieto, Spoleto, Spello, Montefalco, Bevagna, Trevi) then headed southeast to Monopoli where we explored Aberobello (Trulli houses), Ostuni, Matera (Cave houses) then over to the Mediterranean coast for a weeks stay in Tropea (vacation from your vacation). We then trained to Sicily and toured Taormina, Siracusa, Pachino, Trapani, Erice, Scopello, Segesta and Palermo for 10 days. We rented a car for this portion of our travels. It wasn't enough time for Sicily. A beautiful island, wonderful, helpful people and delicious foods. Before we left, we bought the Lonely Planet Guide to Sicily and it was a great help to organise our travel. Not as good as RS but good enough. We also looked at the RS Sicily tour itinerary for highlights of the island. My opinion only of why there isn't a Sicily guidebook yet is that there aren't enough travellers that would purchase the book and it is probably a publishers business decision. I understand that there is a small guidebook printed for the RS tour customers of Sicily so who knows, maybe one day. Buon vacanza, Sherry

I did the RS Sicily tour - actually went several years ago when it included Sicily and Southern Italy - ending in Rome. It was wonderful....we were given some info in the tour booklet - but I used this website
Best of Sicily

Found everything I needed on the many sections of this webpage.
I love Sicily.

Jerry&Stelly,

I don't know why the RS Guidebooks don't cover the southern portion of Italy, so I'm only speculating here. Since the books are revised every year, it could be that the staff have reached the point of saturation, and just don't have the time to expand the coverage to new locations. It could also be that they feel the very south will only be of interest to a few, and therefore it's not worth the effort to provide chapters on that area.

The South Italy tour covers both the Trulli houses in Alberobello and the Caves of Matera and the Sassi (and other locations), so RS does cover that area to some extent. As someone else mentioned, there is indeed a small booklet for members of the Sicily tours, which covers the places visited on the tour. It's not very thick, so it wouldn't be hard to add it as another chapter to the Italy book. It could also be expanded slightly and issued as a separate book.

Your best options for Guidebooks for that part of Italy are probably Lonely Planet (which can also be purchased as PDF E-books or individual chapters). You could also check out DK Eyewitness, Frommer's, Fodors or others.

I agree, I love Sicily and wish there were a RS guidebook for it. But, other guidebooks are available. I like LP, the Blue Guide, and Michelin, among others. Sicily is big and the public transportation connections take some patience. When traveling solo I don't rent a car and manage to get almost everywhere, so it can be done.

Highlights for me: Palermo and daytrips to Erice, Monreale, Segesta and Cefalu (or spend a few days in Cefalu, great artwork in the cathdral and excellent beaches); Siracusa with daytrips to Ragusa and Noto; Taormina; the Islands of Lipari, Stromboli, Vulcano; Piazza Armerina with daytrips to Villa Romana del Casale and Morgantina (Morgantina needs a car); and the southern coast of Agrigento and other towns.

In Southern Italy, RS gets as far as Paestum (great ruins, museum and beaches), but others have mentioned Matera, Alberobello, Ostuni, Trani, the Gargano Peninsula, and on the west coast, Reggio Calabria,Tropea and Capo Vaticano.

Best of Sicily is a good start.

LP and Rough Guide Sicily are the best for practical Steves-type info, just not quite as good. But dont't let that stop you from going!

I would also suggest using bestofsicily.com. Detailed info and you can print up what you want and toss it as you need to.