flying into bologne, going to florence, rome, and flying out of venice. we are staying with friend in florence and plan to do day trips on the train. any ideas? also should we spend more than 2 days in rome? do we need a car? any ideas for hotel in rome and venice(mod price just needs to be clean, we only plan on sleeping there, location is more important we would like to walk. more than 2 days in venice? was thinking of doing an overnight to umbria or another small town any ideas? also dinner at a winery? all ideas welcome 1st trip for all three of us.

You could spend five days in Rome and not come close to seeing everything. You definitely don't want to have a car there. Check out venere.com (ir is it venere.it?) for places to stay.

For Rome accomodations, you might consider Instituto Santa Juliani Falconeri. It is run by the Catholic Church (and clean). It is very well located, near Piazza Navona. It is a bathroom down the hall arrangement and may have a curfew.

You don't need a car to do the cities. You can get to some small towns with out a car.

Two full days in Venice might be enough. You can see most of Rome in 2 or 3 days but also you could take more than a week.

You might want to borrow a few travel books from you local library or buy some.

How many days are you thinking about?

Well robynooo, you could spend a month in Rome and not see all of it but I would personally suggest you spend more than two days in Rome if that works with your schedule and your interest. Not sure how long your trip will be for but if possible (and perhaps it is not) more than two days in Venice would be nice also. Hope you get to see a bit of Bologna since you will be flying into the airport there.

Well, if I had read the title of your thread properly I would have not asked how long you have in Italy, sorry!

I would divide your time between Florence and the countryside of Tuscany, Rome and Venice. Or you could just skip Rome this trip and enjoy Florence, the countryside of Tuscany and Venice and a bit of the region of Veneto and see Rome next time.

It's so hard when posters ask us how they should spend their two weeks in Italy. We don't know you, what your interests are, what the weather will be like, what your idea of "mod price" for a hotel is, etc. The best advice we can give you is to read a guide book (or two) and make a list of places and/or only-in-Italy experiences that appeal to you. Once you have that list in mind, people here will have all kinds of logistical, lodging and dining suggestions. But at this point, all we can tell you is what we would do if it was OUR trip.

some of the hotels in rome ive been looking at are hotel angelo americano $145, hotel solis $158 these both seem to have a central location, but i havent seen any mentions of them on this forum they were rated 3 and 4 star. this seems moderate to me, but ive never been to rome, am i right?

does anyone know of a good winery to have dinner at either umbria or tuscany?

also we are flying out of venice ,so any ideas of hotels would be good

You'll want more than 2 days in Rome. 3 at least. Spanish Steps area or Piazza della Rotondo area where the Pantheon is is where I stay. The Cesar Albergo was reasonable in 2001 when I stayed there. Stayed at the Albergo del Senato on Piazza della Rotondo last year and loved it but it was 300+ per night. I stayed at Hotel King in 97 for my first trip there and if your looking for lower price i got location, helpful staff, clean room. I passed by it last year so it's still around.

ttt

We spent 5 days in Rome and 4-1/2 in Venice and neither stay was nearly long enough to even get all the major sights in.

We like to actually go into the places rather than just walk (or run) by them.

i was planning on two days in rome, 2 days in venice and then day trips out of florence for the remainder, not really into museums.

In Rome we stayed for two nights at a bed&breakfast that was moderately priced and very convenient to the Collisium and Forum. The hosts were wonderful and very helpful in directing us to easy-on-the pocketbook restaurants. See
http://www.italianbandb.com
Good luck.

Hi R,

With 14 days, flying into Bologna and out of Venice, I suggest

2 nights in Bologna, train to Rome (4 nights daytrip to Orvieto), train to Florence (4 nights, daytrip to Siena, daytrip to Pisa/Lucca), train to Venice (3 nights), fly home.

Try the library, get a copy of Bill Bryson's, The Palace under the Alps. Map out the Italian sites...Rome, again, we need to know what time you get up. How old are you, do you want hostels or x star hotels?