Where to stay in Italy

Old Oct 1st, 2015, 11:46 PM
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Where to stay in Italy

Dear Fodor members, I stumbled upon this site by accident and found a lot of useful information in the forum for our upcoming first time trip to Italy for 3 weeks in December (14th to jan3rd). We are family of four(two kids 15 and 20)
We will be flying in and out of Milan. We will rent a car and plan to drive around everywhere.
This is our planned itinerary
Arrive Milan and drive and stay in Verona(visit como, lakes, Milan) - 3 days
Drive close to Venice and stay - 2 days
Drive to Siena and stay for - 7 days ( do day trips to Florence, Pisa, Tuscany, Gubbio, Montepuciano
Drive to Rome and stay -4 days
Drive back to Milan stay 1 night and fly out.

The Idea is we don't want to be checking in and out of the hotels all the time and would like to stay in a place accessible and drive around. When we try booking hotels we don't know the area we should be looking for.
I appreciate any feedback from members about our itinerary or suggestions (area/ hotels) about our trip. Thank you very much.
StellaBryan is offline  
Old Oct 2nd, 2015, 12:05 AM
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Hi Stella, welcome to Fodors, I guess you know about the climate and length of day at that time in Italy. Not a bad plan, watch out for Jet lag on arriving in Milan, driving may not be a great idea, but it depends where you come from.

The Siena stay could be in an appartment, you should get great deals at that time of year and it will allow kids to relax a bit. I think I'd stay in a bigger town in Tuscany (like Siena) than some of the smaller ones which will be a bit shut up in December. Siena is not really big enough to have a bad area.

Now the other issue is what is your budget for accom? Without that we cannot really advise. BTW, words like "moderate" don't help

Do you have any interests we need to take in.
bilboburgler is online now  
Old Oct 2nd, 2015, 12:24 AM
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I assume you have already bought tickets, but if not, or if it isn't that costly to change, buy "multi-city tickets, into one city and out of another. Even if it costs a bit more, you save a day of backtracking and have another day for sightseeing.

If you can't change tickets, don't stay in Milan twice. Put all your time there at the end.

I am not sure that the lakes will be a good choice in December to January. Perhaps someone else will give an opinion.

If you decide to skip the lakes, fly into Venice and out of Rome.

You say, "drive close to Venice." Don't do that. Stay in Venice.

You are doing Florence as a day trip. You might want to reconsider and spend some time in town where there is lots to do inside in case of poor weather.

When you say 2 days or 4 days, are you allowing for travel time?

If you skip the lakes, consider taking trains and renting a car only for the week you are in Tuscany.

Days will be shorter and cold. Keep that in mind for packing and activities. No outdoor cafes, so plan some good restaurants.

I hope Sandralist posts with advice for you. She always offers something unique and logical.
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Old Oct 2nd, 2015, 12:50 AM
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(Thanks Sassafrass!)

StellaBryan,

Driving around northern Italy at that time of year is really NOT advisable. In addition to the possibility of storms that include snow and ice, you face a big hazard of fog in some areas. Because it is the Christmas holidays and you are traveling with a group, you must reserve your hotels in advance. If you wake up in the morning to discover that you cannot safey drive your family to the next destination, it's a big problem.

It would be much better and safer to take the trains.

If you are arriving to Milan, stay there for 2 nights and make a daytrip to Lago di Como by train if the weather is nice.

Then take the train from Milan to Venice, and stay there longer than 2 nights so you can make a day trip to Verona from there. You also might enjoy a day trip to Ferrara. If you stay in Venice longer, you won't be switching hotels so much. You could even rent an apartment.

From Venice you can take the train to Siena, but it would actually be much better if you stayed in Florence instead and went to Siena as a daytrip if the weather is nice. There are lots of thngs to do in Florence, and you can use the trains to also visit Pisa or Bologna or Lucca. If the weather is sunny, you can hire a driver to take you to beautiful hill towns. Gubbio is too far from Tuscany, however, for a day trip and you might prefer San Gimignano and Volterra to Montepuliciano with your teens.

Take the train from Florence to Rome, and take the train back to Milan. Even if you rented a car it would make more sense to leave it in Rome and take the train back to Milan. The train only takes 3.5 hours, whereas driving is 8 hours without stopping, and it is terrible if the weather isn't good.

If you are a very energetic family who has taken long plane flights before, and you know you don't need sleep right away, then you could consider getting off the plane and taking the train right away to Rome. Then go "backwards", traveling north, and end the trip in Milan. Or you could get off the plane and head straight to Venice first.

But if you plan your trip around using a car, you could find yourself unable to go anywhere on some days because of weather, and trying to change hotel reservations, and having a hard time in places like Venice during the Christmas holidays finding a hotel room for 4 people if you couldn't leave by car as you had planned and needed to spend more nights there.

So I suggest planning something like this

Arrive Milan. spend 2 or 3 nights there. Day trip to Lago di Como if weather is nice (take train to Varenna). Maybe a day trip to Bologna.
Train to Venice 4 days. Day trip to Verona. Maybe a day trip to Ferrara.
Trian to Florence and stay for 6 days (day trips to Pisa, Siena, maybe San Gimignano/Volterra, or Bologna)
Drive to Rome and stay 5 days
Drive back to Milan stay 1 night and fly out.

Or vice versa.
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Old Oct 2nd, 2015, 12:54 AM
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Ooops - sorry! I forgot to change "drive" to "train" for the last part of my suggested itinerary. So it should read

Train from Florence to Rome and stay 5 days
Train back to Milan stay 1 night and fly out
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Old Oct 2nd, 2015, 01:02 AM
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I think it sounds fine except that I wouldn't have thought that Verona was a logical base for Lake Como or Milan. Perhaps consider Bergamo instead? Or visit other places from Verona?

You won't want or need a car in Verona itself, Venice, Milan or Rome. The trains will be much more convenient.

If you don't want to stay in Venice itself then I suggest either Padua or Vicenza. Or maybe Treviso?
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Old Oct 2nd, 2015, 01:04 AM
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can't argue with sandralist, except that I would urge you perhaps a little more strongly to put all your time in Milan at the end, and to get the train straight to Venice [that is if you can't change your flights into open-jaw ones].

however, if you are the sort of people whose brains turn to mush on long flights or think that would be too stressful, then Sandralist's itinerary looks fine.

The countryside of Italy can be gorgeous but in December, a big city will give you more to do [and will probably appeal more to your kids] than a small town or a country retreat.

and you want to be IN Venice, not outside it.
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Old Oct 2nd, 2015, 01:06 AM
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Here is video of Verona in the snow 2 years ago in the middle of December

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=geBMIOlFXU8

Here is heavy snow in Siena 4 years ago in the middle of December

http://www.sienafree.it/siena/142-si...na-fotogallery

You need to realize that to get from Venice to Siena, you would need to cross a mountain range. If it is snowing badly in Siena or Verona, the mountains are much worse.

http://immagini.alvolante.it/sites/d...o_neve_mod.jpg

Likewise, it is almost impossible to drive 8 hours on the autostrade from Rome to Milan if it is snowing.

These are pictures taken in December and January of the main autostrade between Rome and Milan when it is snowing

http://www.ilmessaggero.it/ArchivioN...autostrada.jpg
http://www.corriere.it/cronache/10_d...4f02aabc.shtml

http://www.centrometeoitaliano.it/wp...embre-2014.jpg

I could post 100 more pictures like that
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Old Oct 2nd, 2015, 04:44 AM
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Agree that for this trip train makes a lot more sense than car. You can;t use the cars in the centers of cities - they are pedestrian only zones. And staying in the outskirts and trekking to and fro is a waste of time and money - esp if the weather is not good.

A car really only makes sense for visiting towns in Tuscany - and even then you need to park on the outskirts and walk or tram into the center to se the sights.

We have done many road trips in europe but they are much better to see countryside and smaller towns - not major cities - and driving in winter is not recommended unless you ave experience driving in snow and ice (although snow is quite rare it is perfectly possible in all the places you will be going. but rain, wind and fog are quite common.)
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Old Oct 2nd, 2015, 07:11 PM
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Thank you all for the amazing feed back. I'll plan our trip based on the inputs.(not driving for sure
Can anyone recommend a decent hotel or B&B for our stay in these areas? Our budget is about $300 to 400 for a night for 4 people(2 rooms)
I guess closer to the station and public transport is better because we will not rent a car.
Any thoughts on Airbnb?

Thank you all again for the wonderful tips.
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Old Oct 3rd, 2015, 04:53 AM
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Airbnb is fine for Italy, definitely worth checking out. Also look on booking.com. The advantages for using both sites is that you can put in your actual travel dates and get real prices shown to you, and availability.

In Venice, you are traveling during the time of year when Venice can experience low-lying flooding in some areas due to storms and winter tides. Generally the flooding only lasts a few hours, and there are elevated walkways in the affected areas. However, it is best to book a hotel very much outside of the areas that typically flood, because you don't want to get caught needing to move luggage in a flooded zone. Very generally speaking, the area that is between the Rialto bridge and the train station stays dry, so that is a good area to look. The closer you get to piazza San Marco, the more risk you run of being in a flood.

Otherwise, there is really very little advantage to being the near the train stations with the exception of Milan for your last nights, since you need to get to the airports. And as mentioned, the high/dry areas of Venice are closer to the train station. But most Italian train stations were built at the edges of the historic cites, so as not to tear down beautiful buildings. But it is much nicer to stay where the beautiful historic buildings are. Budget for a taxi ride with your luggage. They are usually less than 10 euros.
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