critique my itinerary!!
 

We will be in Italy Sept 29-Oct 10.
Here is our intinerary...what do you think?
Sept 29-Oct 1 Rome 3 nights
Oct 2-train to florence
Oct 3-florence
Oct 4-DAY TRIP RENTING A CAR to Pisa, Lucca, La Spezia and Portofino
Oct 5-DAY TRIP RENTING A CAR to Chianti, Siena, San Gimignano
Oct 6- drive to Venice
Oct 7-Venice
Oct 8-early train to Lake Como
Oct 9-lake Como
Oct- train to Milan in AM late afternoon flight out of Milan

that last day should be OCT 10

Hi
I'd want more time in Venice, but then I always want more time in Venice

Hi Casella,

Looks like a nice trip.

May I suggest that "Please critique my itinerary" is more friendly than "critique my itinerary!!"?

Overall, it's a good itinerary. However, you may not be able accomplish/see everything you plan on those two day trips in Tuscany.

Not bad--a bit hurried but you know that. I prefer 3 nite stays. But, my real comment is why stay in Florence for those 2 day trips. Get the car and stay in Lucca for those 2 nites. It will save you lots of time and avoid driving into and out of Florence. Lucca is a good mid-point for your itinerary.

You will be exhausted, but sounds possible to do. Is there a reason why you want to go to Lake Como? Why not spend more time in either Florence or Venice? Lake Como is a beautiful area, but you should probably more spend more time at the other places...

I have to agree with Bob and provence97
Dont do too much. Spend more time in one place.

Sounds like a great Trip...I was in Italy for two weeks last year and spent a week just in the Lake region...Como is beautiful and special..dont miss it...You can take ferries across the lake to Varenna (the cutest village in Europe ) and Bilagio...

As for Florence...time saving devices...on your first day there buy tickets for the Ufitzi and the National Gallery at another mueuem and avoid the lines....you might rearrange your day trips accordingly rather than stand in lines for hours on your one day in Florence...
On your car trips...are you actually going to try and see all three cities... Pisa can take a day...and Sienna can easily take a day with its 13 museums and churches...Dont miss Siena..probably the best town in Europe...and if you decide you want to do just one city...buses are easy to Sienna ..45 minutes one way for 5 €..

An idea on your drive to Venice is to hit Manatova.... Absolutly amazing and worth the stop...great palace

Have fun...

This is too much traveling. I recommend:

Rome, Florence and Tuscany villages

or
Rome, Venice, Lake Como

Thanks everyone!! I appreciate all of your comments! I realize we may have to cut out some of the stops on our day trips through Tuscany, does anyone have suggestions on what I might cut out there if I have to?

You would need AT LEAST thrice the ime to do it all! With only ten days I would cut off either Como or Venezia, and addone day to Florence, and daytrip one day to Pisa and Lucca only (Pisa can be seen ina couple of hour, but Lucca takes the best part of the day just tpo take a look around) and drive straight to Siena the next day (again a one-day-city). There is little sens in just driving through chianty or any other Tuscan countryside area, if you want to get the feel of it you have to spend at least 3 days in a farmstay. Remeber that there are not must-see in tuscany (actually there are none worldwide), there is just the experience of being there, and you cannot experience it if you move too fast around. If you are going to buzz all about northern Italy + northern Tuscany... Well, you might ee more by renting a tape asd watching it at home (and you will be less tired when the experiene is over).

After considering everyone's comments I think that we have decided to drop the 2 days in lake como and add them on to Tuscany. So now we will have 6 days to spend between Florence and Tuscany. With the extended time, can anyone suggest how we might arrange our itinerary? Assume that how ever many days we are in Tuscany we will have a car. Thank you!!!

Bob the Nav was correct. Try to reduce your time switching hotels and locations. You do not realize how much time checking in and out of hotels, packing and unpacking, really wastes until you are doing it daily.

I like Florence for a HQ. Disagree with Lucca. It may be more centrally located, but I will take staying in Florence any day over Lucca. After 2 separate tries, I never fell in love with Lucca. Many people on this post love the place. Maybe one day I will try it again to see why.

Try to see more of Venice. It is one of the unique cities of the world.

The joy in Tuscany is exactly what someone stated: Just driving around and enjoying the pleasure of being there at a leisurely pace. If you stay in Florence or even Siena, you can do that. We set up HQ in Siena for 1 week and just spent the days exploring the area. It was a great trip!

Hi Casella -
Consider taking the train from Rome to Sienna and arrange a farm stay (5-6 nights) in that area. Then use that as your base for Tuscany and take one or two day trips into Florence (via car or train - don't be scared of taking the car unless you are a timid driver).
From Tuscany drive the car to Venice, drop it off, stay 2-3+ days, then fly home from Venice.
This is the approximate trip we took a couple years ago. We loved the farm stay in Tuscany, and are not big museum people anyway so the Florence day trips suited us fine. Our 6 nights in the farm stay went so quickly, and we met so many wonderful people, I would recommend this approach highly!