AZS

My wife and I are planning a trip to Italy in May for 10 days (not including 2 travel days). As of now we would like to do 3 nights in Rome, 3 nights in Venice and 2 nights in Sorrento. Logistically on the map this looks complicated.

We would prefer to fly into and out of FCO (Rome) because the tickets are cheapest that way. Please advise us on what order to visit the above cities and how to get from one city to the next?

Also should we re-think the cities we want to visit due to logistics?

Thanks

zeppole

It is complicated, and train travel in Italy (which would make more sense than hauling yourselves out to airports and be less expensive) eats up time in Italy.

You'd probably get better advice if you posted more about whether seeing Venice is a lifelong dream, or ditto Rome, or whether it's St Peter's or the antiquities that attract you to Rome -- and just why you've picked Sorrento and whether another pretty place (like a gorgeous lake) would do.

What is the difference in air fare if you make either your departure or your arrival Venice?

ellenem

Do try your itinerary flying into Venice, out of Rome--use the multi-city (open jaw) option to check fares. You have a limited amount of time and having each time you move from city to city, if you must begin and end in Rome, you will waste most of a day. Also keep in mind that the extra money you might spend on an airline ticket may be spent anyway on extra transportation to make the circular route you suggest.

Flying open jaw, I'm assuming you'd visit in this order

Venice 3
Sorrento 2
Rome 3

TuckH

As I suggested on your other thread, you're best off connecting the dots in a straight line instead of zigzagging. Money saved on air fare will be lost on train fare. Not to mention valuable vacation time lost...

AZS

We picked Sorrento because it looked beautiful and we could do the Amalfi Coast as well - no other reason other than the beauty of the place and perhaps some beach time. Another "pretty" place would be fine like by a lake especially in May. Any suggestions to make this itinerary less complicated?

StuDudley

3 days Rome, 3 days Venice, 2 days Sorrento does not add up to 10 days (not including travel).

I agree with others - fly into Venice & out of Rome or Naples.

I've never been a big fan of Sorrento - compared to Positano.

Stu Dudley

StuDudley

How are you going to do the Amalfi Coast - by car, bus???

Starting from Venice, I don't think you can get to the Amalfi Coast, visit it "properly", and return to Rome with only 2 nights on the coast. Getting out of Venice takes some time (unless you stay near the train station - which I would not do), and public transportation past Naples is also time consuming.

If this was my vacation, I would also be a little concerned about the weather in May. The Italian Lake District and the Amalfi Coast are not "sure bets" for great beach weather in early May. I would perhaps do Venice, Tuscany countryside (car), and Rome. This would simplify your travel also.

Stu Dudley

AZS

Thanks Stu. First you are right, 3 nights in Rome, 3 nights in Venice and 2 nights in Sorrento is not 10 days I was going to save 2 days and do another country/city - perhaps wherever our airline does a stopover (Lisbon, Amsterdam or my husband suggested we do Geneva) W

We were going to stay in Sorrento and then take a ferry over to capri. Do you think the weather end of May is not worth the trip there? I would like us to get the most out of this trip - feeling confused on where to go and what to do.

zeppole

If you can't risk going to the Italian lakes in May -- when all the flowers are in bloom, you can practically never go! And there is hardly any guarantee of fair skies in the Tuscan countryside! Not to mention the Tuscan countryside means one of you or both of you behind the wheel of a car.

(I think there ought to be a rule on Fodor's that anybody who recommends driving tours in Italy be made to disclose whether they are the person in the car who does the driving on vacations.)

You might take a look into combining Lago di Como into this itinerary and eliminating the Amalfi coast or Sorrento. You can't swim in Lago di Como, but it is gorgeous! It can easily be combined, by train, with a trip to Venice. Afterwards, take a train to Milano, where you can get a relatively fast train to Roma.

Something else you might find amazing is to spend a night in Orvieto on your way to Rome, or day trip to Rome from Orvieto. It's not out of the way on the train. Once you've taken a look a pictures on the web, you might even decide between a trip that is Venice-Orvieto-Rome or Venice-Lago di Como - Roma.

Be advised it might rain wherever you go. But if it rains while you are on Lago di Como, or in Orvieto, you can get a train to someplace else, like Milan or Verona. Or Mantova or Bergamo. It's hard to have a lousy time in Italy, whatever the weather. But the easiest way to have a lousy time is to spend too much time on the Italian train system, or behind the wheel of a car if you're not used to driving in Italy, trying to dash from one destination to another.

If you only saw Venice and Rome, and considered some day trips from each (like to the island of Torcello in Venice, or to Orvieto in Rome) you really wouldn't come home disappointed.

zeppole

`if it turns out you really want to go to Capri, go to Capri and stay there. May is generally a lovely time to be there, and if you get there and it is non-stop fog and rain, bite the bullet and head to the mainland to see Pompeii and the treasures of Napoli. Or just do something else.

Almost all Italian hotels have a 24 or 48 hour cancellation policy. That means if you check the internet and see rainy weather forecasts, you can cancel and rebook someplace else. Its less scary than it sounds.

But go where you want to go. I personally would want to stay in a bit more geographically compact area, with convenient train connections -- although if you enjoy driving in Italy (I do, up to a point) then don't let me discourage you.

StuDudley

The first non-train-change train leaves Venice at 10:43 and arrives in Naples at 4:46pm. This is just a guess, but I suspect you won't get to Sorrento & into your hotel till 6:30pm at the earliest. So, this day is kinda wasted.

I would certainly not leave Sorrento & take the trip to Capri for your only "adventure" on the Amalfi coast. We spent 2 nights in Capri in early Sept & it was quite crowded during the day, but dreamy in the early am & late afternoon when the day trippers left. Seems to me your Amalfi/Capri trip will force too much travel time and not enough "being there".

I would certainly not add any other destinations to your itinerary. You really only have 2 1/2 days in Venice, 1 day in Capri/Sorrento, and 2 1/2 days in Rome. 2 1/2 in Venice is marginal, 2 1/2 in Rome is about 1 1/2 days short of minimum time (IMO). Traveling 1 1/2 days for 1 day's worth of enjoyment in Sorrento/Capri would not seem worth it to me.

I would land in Venice, and spend 3 nights there. Then take the train to Siena, rent a car, and visit some of the small villages and beautiful countryside in southern Tuscany around Pienza. Stay 3 nights in Pienza, San Quirico, or Montepulciano. Early in the am, drive to Orvieto, visit, dump the car, and take one of the many trains to Rome & spend the remaining time (should be 4 nights) in Rome. Fly home from Rome.

It seems like I have posted the same itinerary about 4 times in the last 2 months.

Stu Dudley

AZS

Thanks for the feedback. I prefer not to drive as well and also prefer not to be getting on and off trains. We are not set on going to Capri and are open to ideas. I prefer a more geographically compact trip/itinerary. So knowing that and knowing that we would like to do Rome and Venice - what do you now suggest? Lago di Como sounds interesting.....

Dayle

AZS,

Devote all your days possible to Italy, you will not be sorry. Don't make the typical mistake of trying to cram in too many destinations. You actually get more for your money and time if you plan your time geographically.

10 days:

3 days Venice
3 days Lago di Como (or Tuscan/Umbrian countryside)
4 days Rome

Save the Amalfi Coast for a southern Italy trip. You will be back!

Buon viaggio!

StuDudley

Jeeze zeppole - lots of peole rent cars & drive in Italy. We've spent months driving in Italy, and years driving in France.

The OP mentioned "beach time' - which is less enjoyable with rain or overcast skies.

Stu Dudley

zeppole

`if you don't want to rent a car, the Tuscan countryside is not accessible by public transportation -- and there is no particular weather advantage going there.

If you don't want to keep getting on and off trains, then you have to limit destinations to two or three, and even then you might face a train change en route. (One of the reasons the pretty parts of italy are so pretty is that they are not easy to get to!)

However, pack really light -- nothing heavier than what you can easily carry up a flight of stairs or lift onto a train (and backpacks are great for this) and you should be fine.

Take a look at some pictures of Lago di Como:

http://images.google.com/images?clie...a=N&tab=wi

Varenna is the easiest town to reach by train:

http://images.google.com/images?um=1...=Search+Images

Just make sure you have lunch in Bellagio one day to admire the view from there. It's a five minute boat ride away.

zeppole

`stu, do you do the driving? Just curious.

Anyway, AZS doesn't want to rent a car.

StuDudley

My wife does most of the driving - but she certainly enjoys looking at the scenery while doing so. Neither of us particularly likes driving & spending time in the car, but I don't know of another convenient way to explore the dirt roads in the Val d'Orcia, or visit Sant Antimo Abbey, etc other than driving.

Normally we rent cars for 5-6 weeks in June/July and 4 weeks in Sept. We try to limit our time in the car to 3 hrs max per day. Many days we spend 0 time in the car. If we have a long haul (like Paris to the Dordogne this coming June), we'll take the train - which we prefer over flying.

Stu Dudley

mhyde1

We went to Italy and Sicily in October, and we would not have made it without the suggestions on Fodor's site! Zeppole was a lot of help as were several others I do not see listed. They advised us that we were spending too much time traveling, and they were right. Wish we had narrowed it down to three places and stayed longer. Wish we had flown into Palermo and out of Rome. Would have saved so much time, but we really wanted to see the countryside and the ferry going from Italy to Sicily. It is really beautiful.

zeppole

I think if you go to the same places year after year, maybe the driver can enjoy looking at scenery while driving a winding, narrow and unpaved Italian farm road through vertical hillsides, but most people are not going to find that to be the case -- and usually one person does turn out to be doing most of the driving in my experience.

I really enjoy driving in Italy, although where I live in Liguria, you do NOT look at the scenery while you drive the hairpin turns over the cliffs dodging the grandmothers with their groceries, the mothers with their stollers and the cyclists and vespa riders and small trucks and large buses -- although scenery is great once you get out and walk.

I walk around the hills to enjoy the views. And mainly I do that all over Italy rather than try to do it while driving.

danalou55

Hi AZS,

One of the most wonderful trips of my life (and I travel a lot with my now 14 and 18 year old boys and husband) was two summers ago driving through much of Italy for four weeks. My husband couldn't be there for that trip. We flew into Rome, stayed for a week, rented a car eventually, drove north to Orvieto and into remarkable Tuscany, (stayed in Greve en Chianti @ Villa Villamaggio 45 minutes south of Florence), explored Sienna, and many of the perfect little walled towns there, drove to Florence for a couple of days, took the train to Venice, then to Verona and Lago di Como. That's the very abbreviated version.
I would do Rome, Tuscany, Florence, Venice, Verona (even an afternoon there is magical), then Como, and fly out of Milan.

Forget the beach. Go at home. The weather could be iffy, and Capri is OK, but definitely not worth a quick trip, and Sorrento...no way. Maybe nearby Pompeii for a tour and Positano, but why waste your time on Sorrento? And it's way off the beaten path IF you want to get to Venice.

The Amalfi coast is a separate trip coupled with Sicily and/or Apulia perhaps. having done both at various times, I really think it's too much to do Rome and Venice and then go south. You're not taking in what's between those cities.

The best advice I was ever given before that italy trip was not to rush through Italy. Savor it...and by all means, go to Geneva on another trip only if you're flying into or out of Europe. I could have spent six months in Italy and not have gotten bored at all.

Have a wonderful trip, whatever you do.
Dana