4 weekend trips from Venice
 

I am spending 5 weeks in Venice with my husband who is taking classes there. We will have Friday through Sunday (we would be able to leave Thursday night and possibly could even come back early Monday morning if we had to) for four weekends to see the rest of the country and/or surrounding countries. What would you do with four open weekends in Italy? Neither of us have been to Italy before so we have not seen anything. Rome is probably going to be one full weekend but other than that we are looking for suggestions. We hope to use trains or low cost airlines rather than driving. Suggestions are appreciated!

1. Rome
2. Florence
3. Lake Como
4. Wild card...perhaps go back to one of the three above, perhaps travel with someone else attending the course, perhaps Switzerland (for the long week-end of Thursday-Monday) perhaps just stay put in Venice.
What a lovely problem to have! Have a wonderful time! What do you plan to do with yourself while your husband is taking classes?

Hi Jenny,

You might want to consider Verona, Bologna or a drive through Tuscany.

I will be exploring Venice during the day! I would love to find some kind of job but have no idea how to go about that. I am a teacher so this is a great get-away for me! My husband's classes are only about 4 hours a day. That said, he will have work to do for his classes that he will try to get done during the week so we can do our trips on the weekends. Staying put in Venice for a weekend probably won't be necessary because we should see a lot of it during the week. Thanks for the suggestions. Any hotel ideas or transportation hints would also be helpful!

How about a loop from Venice up through Bassano del Grappa, into the Dolomites, back down south into Verona and then return to Venice?

Verona has the famous arena, a lovely shopping district, great cafes and wine bars. The Dolomites are spectacular and since much of the area was Austrian, it has a different atmosphere from other parts of Italy. Friends really enjoyed exploring the Veneto around Bassano del Grappa on several of their trips, so I am going on their advice (and other comments here) for that suggestion.

Your plan sounds great. I don't think you could go wrong with most of the suggestions you will get.

Trieste, or a bit further (or a catamaran trip from Venice) Rovinj, Croatia. Beautiful!