Hello, this summer my girlfriend and I will be visiting France and Italy for about two weeks, though we will be in the latter for about 5 days. We are meeting friends in Venice and renting a car and hoped to see Cinque Terre and a bit of Tuscany before heading to Rome. I'll acknowledge up front that this is a tight schedule and in a perfect world we'd love to spend multiple days and see many more things, but that is going to have wait until next time. My question is what is the best strategy to see Cinque Terre and some parts of Tuscany in about two full days. Here's the only definite plans so far:
- Leave Venice by car the morning of July 1st and head southwest;
- Get into Rome the afternoon/evening of July 3rd.
The issue is where to stay and how to tackle the in-between. One thought I had was to stay somewhere within day-trip distance of cinque terre, say Lucca, and make a day trip of it on the 2nd. That way we get the part of the first day/evenings in the country and can still hit cinque terre. Are there better towns/areas/accommodations to consider? One thing to note is we'd prefer to stay in a secluded B&B/Villa than a busy-ish downtown.
Another option thrown around is to stay around Porto Venere and cover Tuscany on the way down to Rome.
Any other thoughts or suggestions would be much appreciated.
Thanks!
Cinque Terre/Tuscany Travel Assistance Needed
Recent Activity
View all Europe activity »
- 1 HELP stuck in Italy
- 2 Accommodation in Lauterbrunnen
- 3 Wimpy's
- 4 Train from Amsterdam to Bruges
- 5 Last monte Paris apartment
- 6 Berlin's New Barbie Dreamhouse Opens to Feminists' Protests
- 7 Going to London for the first time at the end of May ALONE
- 8 large supermarket in Munich - where?
- 9 Venice Hotel near Cruise Terminal
- 10 10 days in Cortona- any suggestions ?
- 11
Solo in Sicily - April 2013
- 12 ? re hotels in 5 terre
- 13 Places to stay for a tour of Normandy
- 14 Solo Female First Time Traveler - Scared to Death
- 15 Transportation from Venice Island to Treviso Airport?
- 16 Nice
- 17 charming small French city for weeklong stay?
- 18 Beatiful place near Aix-en-Provence or not too far from St Paul de Vence
- 19 I Need To Vent!
- 20 Should We Do Segovia With only 2 1/2 Days in Madrid?
- 21
TR Provence, Israel, Switzerland, Italy..April 16 a day of AA infamy
- 22 Train tickets
- 23 San Lorenzo Market
- 24 Oceania Cruises - Anyone ever gone on one of these?
- 25 Trip in June to andulusia and algrave portugal


Skip the CT and spend 2 nites in Tuscany.
Look at this lovely B&B.
http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g644280-d1016646-Reviews-Agriturismo_Sant_Anna_in_Camprena-Pienza_Tuscany.html
Thanks. But we'd really like to try to do both.
Are you a truck driver by chance? This itinerary sounds like our honeymoon many years ago, we drove through yosemite park in the dark. I know the road was long and winding, but didn't see a thing!
Less is more !
I'm with the others, but if you can't be dissuaded ....
Rent the car the day before (June 30) so that you can get a very early start. And I mean early, like 5-6 a.m. The drive from Venice to somewhere on the CT will be upwards of 5 hours.
The next day, leave early again and head to southern Tuscany (the area of Montepulciano, Pienza, San Quirico, Montalcino). The drive from the CT will be 3.5-4 hours.
On the third morning, leave early again, make your way to Orvieto and drop the car. (Make sure you know the open hours of the rental agency office.) Then, explore Orvieto for a few hours before catching a train to Rome. The drive would take about an hour and the train another hour.
Make sure you have good road maps and/or GPS and an International Driver's Permit.
You actually have one full day and several hours on 2 others. Yuo don;t have time to do CT and Tuscany - pick one and see a small part.