Please help with planning Italian honeymoon
 

Hi guys,
We are looking to plan a 10-day honeymoon in Italy in end of July / beginning of August. We have narrowed down our possibly destinations to Rome, Venice, Amalfi Coast, and Lake Como. We have a moderate budget, and we're hoping to spend half the time relaxing and half sightseeing. Any suggestions for itinerary? Ideally we would visit two of the above. Thanks!

Congratulations!

Warning: all those locations are very busy in July and August, especially Venice. And the Amalfi coast is a bit complicated to get to and from.

Maybe fly into Milan and go to Lake Como for 4 or 5 days, get over jet-lag and wedding stress. Stay midlake and take the ferries around. Look for places to stay in Varenna; they tend to be more reasonably priced and it's on the train line.

Then take a train to Rome, sightsee for 5 days or so and fly home from there.

Buy open-jaw plane tickets (multi-city); they should cost about the same as round-trip and save you the time and money to backtrack. Look at seat61.com for details on using Italian trains. Buying your train ticket, Lake Como to Rome, 3 months or so early can save you a lot of money.

Good luck!

If you get stuck with round trip tickets in and out of one city, I think the more natural pairings are Venice and Como, or Rome and the AC.

It's true that the AC is more complicated to get to and from, but if you're young and energetic, it would be fairly fabulous.

Another thought: I have always wondered why those of us, including me, visiting Come mid-lake, don't consider Menaggio.

Anyone know? It seems that plenty of boats stop there and that there are a variety of places to stay and eat.

What is a "moderate budget" in dollars and cents per night of lodging?