Italy Honeymoon 2 Week June Itinerary Suggestions
 

Hi all, I am traveling to Italy for two weeks in June and I am looking for suggestions. I mostly want to know if we're trying to pack too much into the trip. The one place my fiance really wants to visit is Venice. The once place I'd like to visit is Val Masino so we can get a couple of days of rock climbing in. We can get direct flights to Rome, so we're definitely going to fly into/out of Rome. Here's the tentative plan for the trip:

Day 1 - Fly into Rome, relax
Day 2 - Explore Rome
Day 3 - Train to Venice
Day 4 & 5 - Explore Venice
Day 6 - Train to Verona, rent a car and drive to Val Masino (Sondrio?)
Day 7 & 8 - climb
Day 9 - Drop off the car (Milan? back to Verona?), Train to Cinque Terre
Day 10 & 11 - Hike and beach it up in Cinque Terre
Day 12 - Train to Rome
Day 13 - Explore Rome
Day 14 - Fly home

Too much IMO. I would drop the Cinque Terre because of the travel time involved. But it's your trip.

Don't stay in Rome twice. If you can't fly out of Pisa at the end, then train to Venice immediately on arrival in Rome on Day 1 and put all of your Rome days at the end. It makes for a very long travel day at the beginning, but IMO that beats the additional hotel change. Some people also find starting in Venice less brain-challenging.

You could rent the car upon leaving Venice and eliminate the time involved in taking the train to Verona and getting to the rental office.

Depending on the day of the week, you could drop the car in Rapallo and then train to your destination in the CT.

Check car rental offices' open/closed days and hours and time your arrivals accordingly. Each driver will need an International Drivers Permit.

Yes, avoid staying in Rome twice. Do the computation. You would be consuming half to almost a day in doing the Rome twice.
Is flying direct into Rome absolutely compelling over any other considerations? Have you actually done a side by side comparison against flying into Venice and returning from Rome?

I really like the idea of going to Venice directly on the first day, I hadn't thought of that!

I just compared airline prices for different combos of flying into and out of different cities (Venice, Rome, Milan are the cheapest), and they all add up to around an extra $1000.

We had that same problem flying from Australia a few years ago - the 1/2 day lost for the $1K+ was worth it. I agree with not splitting Rome time up though. If it were me (and this is what we did) I would put Rome first and Cinque Terre last (depending on the flight times). I always feel like at the beginning of a holiday I have loads of energy and want to see as much as I can see and can deal with crowds (which Rome is great for!) but by the end I want to hang out and relax (which CT is great for). We had late afternoon flights out of Rome so took the train from CT on that day and then flew out. Worked great.

I don't think you have too many places either.

Day 1 to 4 - fly to Rome & Rome
Day 5 to 7 - train to Venice & Venice (personally I would take one day from here and add it to Rome)
Day 8 to 10 - to Verona & Climbing
Day 11 to 13 - to CT & CT
Day 14 - to Rome & home

I agree that grouping your time in Rome makes more sense. And I always feel more comfortable being in the city from which I'm departing the night before - just in case. So I would leave Rome until the end.

Why Verona? Is it just to pick up a car or do you plan to spend time there? If the former, then you could hire a car closer to Val Masina. You could also look to see whether local buses would obviate the need for a car at all.

Cinque Terre can be very crowded - it's become too popular with tourists, particularly Americans and Australians. And I found the beaches to be very disappointing but perhaps I was at the wrong ones?

How are you computing your airfares? Are you from the U.S.?
From U.S. to Europe, multi-city flights don't differ much from the round trip fares.
Two one-way fares, on the other hand, are significantly more expensive and at about the difference you mentioned.

Greg you are my hero! I am from the US! I did not know the multi city flights option even existed! I was comparing prices for two one way fares. Flying into Venice and out of Rome is even a little cheaper than a Rome roundtrip option. This is fantastic news, here's a revised plan:
Day 1-4 Fly to Venice, do romantic honeymoon stuff
Day 5-7 Climbing in Val di Mello
Day 8-10 Relaxing in Cinque Terre
Day 11-13 Rome and home

Dreamon - looking at the map, Verona looked to be on the way from Venice to Sondrio. I didn't think about renting a car closer to Val Masino which is a good idea. We do need a car so we can haul crashpads (climbing gear) up to the mountains and then back down to the hotel. We also have to stop at Sondrio on the way there and on the way back to rent and drop off crasphads.

You are not out of the woods yet. Which airport are you having a layover and how much time? Airlines claim they are legal layovers, but we beg to differ at airports like Paris, CDG. Yeah, they have to deal with missed connections at their expense, but it is better if you don't start your honeymoon that way in the first place. Although, it is such a snafu that makes honeymoon memorable.

The multi-city option must be one of the the most overlooked cost and time saving strategy even though all the booking sites offer this option sometimes by going beyond "quick booking" offered on the home page.

2.5 hour layover in Philly on the way to Venice. Nonstop flight back from Rome. I think it sounds pretty solid!

Nice! Glad that worked out for you. One hint - we didn't actually stay in CT, we were in Santa Margherita Ligure. Fodors says of it "This is a pleasant, convenient base, which for many represents a perfect balance on the Italian Riviera: more spacious than the Cinque Terre; less glitzy than San Remo; more relaxing than Genoa and environs; and ideally situated for day trips, such as an excursion to Portofino."

In your first itinerary, you noted the travel days. In the latest version, you don't. You'll lose a half-day or more moving from place to place.

And just btw - we were in CT this past summer and most of the trails were closed. It was also crazy crowded.

Jean, yes, the travel times will still hold over. But with the multi city flights I'll reduce the train time by at least half a day!

Hez, thanks for the info bud! Do you guys recommend any other coastal towns? We're trying to get a feel for northern Italy on this trip I guess, by hitting Venice, mountains, coastal town, maybe a Tuscan town on the way to Rome, and then Rome.

Thanks again all!

No worries!

When you're climbing you'll be less than an hour from Lake Como. Gorgeous area. We stayed in Varenna which we loved. It also has ferries to other awesome towns on the lake. We took a few truly gorgeous walks in the area. You could easily head over there for an afternoon/evening if you have a car.

In Venice, we took a ferry to Burano which we really loved - http://www.isoladiburano.it/en/index.html

We also loved the Peggy Gugenheim museum in Venice. http://www.guggenheim-venice.it/

Congratulations on your upcoming nuptials.

H

Someone on our trip had an accident, and they spent a week in the hospital in Innsbruck. Getting her home was extremely expensive. We once had to fly my mother out of Aspen, Colorado after having a heart attack--in a private jet.

I hope you're a world class rock climber, because boulder climbing at this location is very dangerous. See: http://www.melloblocco.it/en/ Melloblocco is northeast of Milan--well off the beaten path.

May I suggest you check into additional travel insurance coverage on InsureMyTrip.com. They do have programs that include participating in dangerous sports. You don't want to do any thing so dangerous without having insurance that'll get you home if there's a problem.

I don't intend to be pessimistic. You just need to be aware of problems you can face if you're not prepared for every situation.

You'd do best to skip Cinque Terre and go straight to Florence for a couple of days before taking the train to Rome.