sienna or cinque terre?
 

we will be visiting italy for our first time, arriving in venice for 3 nights and I don't know whether we should divide our time between florence and sienna (4/3) or florence and cinque terre (5/2) and then off to rome for 4 nights. Either venice,Ct, Flo & rome ------ or Venice,Flo, sienna & rome. We will be there in october 3-18th. The other alternative would be to go to venice 3 nights, florence (one week) and 4 nights in rome and do all the day trips from florence to lucca, sienna, bologna etc. what do you think?

Siena and the CT are both great. The CT would be great if you want a few days off from your vacation. It's important to take a few days in the middle of your trip to recharge your tourism batteries: sleep in, read a good book, enjoy nature -- all without the mental pressure of having to see another museum or more ruins.

A week for Florence seems excessive. With 14 nights in northern Italy I suggest this: 3 nights Venice, 3 nights Florence, 2 nights in the CT, 3 nights in a rural town in Tuscany or Umbria (such as Siena), and then 3 nights in Rome.

Doing day trips from Florence to the various hill towns in Tuscany is a fine idea, but there is nothing like staying in one of those towns overnight. Look into renting an agriturismo (an Italian farmhouse) to be your homebase instead.

Agree with Edward. Don't spend a week in Florence - it's such a busy place and getting in and out of town for daytrips would be a hassle. Better to spend some nights in one of the smaller towns. The plan Edward laid out sounds fabulous to me with a great mix of things to do. The only downside is moving around a bit more - but still, I think it's well worth it.
Karen

We spent 11 nights in Florence, with daytrips to Fiesole, Siena, Bologna, Lucca, Orvieto and Venice.

Didn't have any problems getting in/out of the city. Didn't find it particularly busy.

ira - what month were you there? We found traffic to be a nightmare in June a couple years ago. Maybe it has to do with the time of year? Or maybe we just happened to hit a bad week.