Civitavecchia? Tuscania?
 

We'll be on a cruise that stops at Civitavecchia. Not interested in going into Rome (this time). What's Civitavecchia like? Pleasant to stroll around? (Not interested in shopping.) There is a ship excursion that goes to Tuscania. What's it like? Worth doing?

Thanks for advice!

Hi Poss,

Some video here will introduce you to Civitavecchia and things to see, including Tuscania:

http://www.webvisionitaly.com/category.php?id=277

This area was founded by the Etruscans about 3000 years ago - there is much to see and do for day trips, and ehre is another video with some suggestions on day trips:

http://www.webvisionitaly.com/catego...p;ref_item=346
(this video will be working later today - was not updated to play with new media player...)

Hi P,

Very little to do in Civitavecchia.

Take the train to Florence.
See
www.trenitalia.com/en/index.html


A DAY IN FLORENCE:

Train to Florence SMN:
The Luggage Office is to your left as you leave the train.

From Piazza d' Stazione, walk up via Nazionale to via d'Ariento and the Mercato Centrale, wander through.

Take any street going NE to Via Degli Alfani and go right to the Accademia for The David.

Take via Ricasoli SE to the Duomo, the Baptistry and the Opera Museum (Originals of the bronzes on the doors)

From the Campanile, take via Calzaiuoli S (do some window shopping) to the Piazza d' Signoria. Look around, take a break.

Continue S to the Uffizi. Visit.

From the Uffizi, walk W along the Arno River to the Ponte Vecchio.

(You can walk up to the Pitti Palace and the Boboli Gardens if there is time. Great views of Florence from the top of the Gardens)

If you have time, walk E along the S bank of the river to Ponte alle grazie and cross over to visit Santa Croce.

If not, go W along the Arno from Ponte Vecchio to Ponte S. Trinita and go right. Go left on Via d'Spada to via d'Fossi and go right to Santa Maria Novella. Look around.

SMN is across the square from the train station.

If you have time, take the no. 7 bus (you can find it at the SMN train station) up to Fiesole (0:20 hr 1E) to watch the sunset from the terrace of the Bar Bleu.

Be sure to have lots of gelato (in a cup, not a cone), take some wine breaks and a light lunch.

Train schedules, prices and tickets are at http://www.trenitalia.com/en/index.html
Call center from outside Italy is 39-06-68475475

Bus routes are at http://www.ataf.net/
Buy your ticket before you get on the bus. Stamp it in the yellow box on the bus.

Uffizi and Academia Museum Reservations
The easiest and cheapest way is to call Florence 1010987 (dial around number), 011 (U.S. international access code) 39 (Italy's country code) then 055-294-883 8:30-18:30 M-F and 8:30-12:00 Sat. Florence time. There is a long listing of press 1 for this and 2 for that--press 4 for bookings. You will get an English speaking operator and in 2-3 minutes YOU CAN RESERVE FOR BOTH. This is through the reservation service at the Uffizi and costs beyond the normal entry fee only about 3 euro for the service. This is MUCH cheaper than the commercial booking services.

You will not be charged for the reservations unless you use them.

Have a nice visit.

((I))

Unless I am mistaken, and that is always possible, the majority of the train service from Civitavecchia to Florence would be routed through Rome anyway..the place you didn't want to go to.

How long do you have in Civitavecchia? Without knowing the answer to that question, there's no way of working out where you could go.

The cruise ships typically stop for either day trip or one night. Either way traveling to Florence is a bit much, especailly for someone who is not interested in shopping!

Livorno, the closer cruise port to Florence, is a better option for a day trip to Florence.

IMO, there is much worth seeing and enjoying in this beautifully undiscovered piece of the Italian coastline.

You can go to Toscania, Tarquinia (named after the Etruscan King who the Ancient Romans embraced), and make it all the way to Viterbo, about 60 miles from the port. There is much to do for a day in Viterbo. See some video of Viterbo here:

http://www.webvisionitaly.com/catego...p;ref_item=284

I agree that there is a much to see in Lazio, but I wouldn't pick Viterbo or Tarquinia as places to send people on their own from a cruise ship.

I think Tuscania would make a fascinating excursion. It's always hard to answer "is it worth it?" for someone else. For me, it would be worth it just to get off the super-beaten tourist track and see a deeper side of historic Italy.

Here are some pictures.

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

Hmmm ! I think Ira was thinking it was Livorno.

Civitavecchia is hardly worth spending a day there. I don't know why zeppole wouldn't send people on their own to Viterbo or Tarquinia, but whatever reasons s/he has, there are no cannibals and no wild animals in Tarquinia nor in Viterbo. All three are major sights, Viterbo is certainly no. 3 among them (a remarkable but not exciting medieval town center). Tarquinia has the best Etruscan tombs on this planet, a dozen or so, all frescoed, in an amazing state of preservation (each tomb is accessible and closed, respectively, every second day, to make this state of preservation last, so you can always visit half of the extant tombs); plus an excellent Etruscan museum. Tuscania has two of Italy's best pre-Romanesque (actually, late Langobardic - 10th/11th century) churches. Both towns also have pleasant medieval cores. Both are among the most rewardings places of undiscovered Italy.

Actually, there are quite a few wild animals in that area of Lazio, but let that be.

Viterbo is a very large and busy place, ringed by modern construction and roaring with traffic and with a limited historic center for those interested in pleasant strolls. Both it and the much smaller Tarquinia have quite noticeabe impacts from poverty. Most foreign visitors headed to Tarquinia for the outstanding museum comment on the sad state of the town, and for those unused to Italian urban poverty, it looks more alarming than it is.

So that's why I wouldn't send people coming from a cruise shop in search of pleasant strolls to Viterbo or Tarqunia.

Tourists with a deep interest in the history of Italy, and its art and architecture, are well-advised to spend time in Lazio, including Viterbo and Tarquinia.

On second thought, I don't want to let my reaction to someone else's sarcasm dicourage people from visiting Tarquinia, or Viterbo. They are both fine destinations, perhaps all the more rewarding for being off most people's tourist maps.

But since they haven't got a booming tourist industry, finding one's way to them and touring them on an excursion from a cruise ship probably means some extra planning.

Were it me, I would investigate getting a driver to take me, preferably one who knew both towns and could offer guidance about sightseeing, and do some reading up beforehand about how to best organize one's time there.

I've stayed in both Tuscania and Tarquina and don't remember either one. That's my best input, they were likely lovely places, but to me unmemorable.

Isn't Tuscania where Romeo and Juliet was filmed?

Actually, though I am sarcastic sometimes, I didn't intend to be this time. I was convinced you had your reasons, zeppole, but since you didn't originally give them, I couldn't imagine which reasons, and didn't want people to imagine Viterbo and Tarquinia as dangerous in any possible sense (so many tourists unfamiliar with Italy anticipate "dangerous" cities/towns). And again without any sarcasm, I don't share your view of those two towns. Neither is Viterbo "very large" (in fact, 60000 inhabitants), nor did I perceive them, on my last visit five years ago, as poverty-stricken. On the contrary, I found Tarquinia greatly improved since my first visit in 1990. THEN it had been much poorer, yes. The second time, not really. Poverty, of course, is relative, but in any case, Viterbo is not Naples, and Tarquinia is not Palermo, both of which are really poor cities. Beyond doubt, as compared to Milano, Parma or Vicenza, Viterbo and Tarquinia ARE poor. But certainly not to an extent that would spoil the visit of - I dare say - most tourists.

franco,

Thanks for the clarification. I think some of the reason I posted as I did was because of reactions from tourists who had been there quite some time ago. I've seen from other posts that you live in Italy, and so do I. Although I encourage people at every minute to get off the beaten tourist track, and to realize that some places right next door to the most famous places are just as nice as the famous places -- sometimes even better -- I also realize that some travelers, maybe even most, really will prefer Chianti to Tarquinia, or Portofino to Perugia.

But I do think that someone from a cruise ship with limited time would find it frustrating to make their way to Viterbo's historic center without help, and that it probably is best to have a guide in Tarquinia, for no other reason that the points of interest there are dispersed.

I do think of Viterbo as a big place. But then I live in an Italian village.

But anyone with a chance to go to Tarquinia should take it.

Zeppole, what village do you live in? Why did I think you lived in NY?

>Hmmm ! I think Ira was thinking it was Livorno.<

Thank you, Bob.

"Never mind".

((I))

I live in the Ligurian hills not far from Genova. I am a New Yorker by birth.

Many thanks for the plethora of information! Very helpful indeed.

It seems only the church and tomb schenes were in Tuscania.

Set in a 15th-century Renaissance period, Romeo & Juliet was filmed entirely in Italy in varying locations:[2]

The balcony scene: At the Palazzo Borghese, built by Cardinal Scipione Borghese in the 16th century, in Artena, 20 miles south of Rome.
The church scenes: At a Romanesque church named St. Pietro in Tuscania, 50 miles northwest of Rome.
The tomb scene: Also in Tuscania.
The palace of the Capulets scenes: At Palazzo Piccolomini, built between 1459-62 by Pope Pius II, in the city of Pienza, in Siena province.
The street scenes: Also in Pienza.
The fight scenes: In Gubbio, a town in Umbria province.