Suggestions for Rome and Sicily
 

We booked a last min trip to Rome and Sicily a couple days from now(!) for 10 nights from the US. I would greatly appreciate suggestions on the following:

a) I am able to find a few Colosseum tickets for the 2.5 days we will be in Rome (we previously visited Rome, it's just new for our younger child). No luck with Vatican tickets though. Any suggestions? Are there any walk up tickets available?
b) Planning to travel to Sicily after 3 nights in Rome. Is it better to fly to Palermo or Catania?

Within Sicily, rough itinerary (assuming starting in Palermo). Suggestions are appreciated.
a) Palermo - 2 nights (Palermo, side trip to Scopello and San Vito lo Capo)
b) Messina/Catania - 3 nights (Cefalu on the way, Messina/Catania, Taormina, Mt. Etna, Syracuse) - Is Messina or Catania a better base? Is Messina or Syracuse worth seeing? May have to cut some here
c) Agrigento - 1 night (Valley of the temples)
d) Palermo - 1 night (side trip? on the way) - return rental car early the next morning for flight back to FCO

I'd scrap Catania and focus on Syracuse and more focused Ortigia.
From Palermo I'd look at Monreale as the obvious visit (bus goes there for peanuts)
Fly to Palermo. If you do the Catania flight there are long distance coaches to Palermo
In fact the trains and coaches on the island make visiting all over easy apart from the Villa Romana del Casale but there may well be tours there

If you’ve already visited the Vatican museums, I guess you know what you are in for, and you know your children, but those museums are very low on my list of places where I’d drag around anyone under 10. St Peter’s Basilica itself is always open (except Wednesday mornings) and quite thrilling enough.

Can also recommend Domus Aurea, if you are able to score tickets, or the Colonna Palace, just the right length of tour.

I wouldn't dream of visiting the Vatican Museums in the daytime in summer. Aside from being insanely crowded, there is no air-conditioningin in most of the museum. Someone once said, "If you faint, you won't hit the ground."

There are evening tours, that (at least 10 years ago) weren't as crowded. Otherwise I would only go midweek in late January.

I agree that St. Peter's Basilica is well worth the visit, but I think there are fairly long queues for security, at least there were the last time I was there, pre-Covid.

Thank you all for the suggestions. Is this a crazy itinerary? We would be skipping Cefalu (does that make sense?).

a) Day 1 - Arrive in Palermo, drive to Naxos (3 hours) - arrive around 4 PM - relax - overnight at Naxos
b) Day 2 - Etna - overnight at Naxos
c) Day 3 - Taormina, may be Castelmola or Savuca on Day 2 or 3 - overnight at Syracuse
d) Day 4 - Visit Syracuse & Ortigia - overnight at Syracuse
e) Day 5 - Agrigento day trip - overnight at San Vito la Capo (seems like a 4 hour drive + stops!!)
f) Day 6 - San Vito la Capo - overnight at San Vito la Capo
g) Day 7 - Palermo - overnight at Palermo
h) Day 8 - early morning flight to Rome

PS: We will be there in 5 days and don't have any reservations yet :-)

Skipping Cefalu doesn't seem to me a big deal; skipping Monreale does!

If you are arriving in Palermo after crossing multiple time zones, driving within a day or two of arrival is a VERY VERY VERY bad idea. Doing so is MUCH more dangerous to yourselves and to others than most people recognize.

By Naxos, shall we assume you mean Giardini Naxos, the town under Taormina? It's my least favorite part of the island. Naxos has little to offer, IMO, and Taormina is so over-touristed as to be painful.

IMO, Siracusa deserves at least 2 or 3 days. Lkewise for Palermo.

While Agrigento can be seen as a day trip, I don't recommend it -- the site is vast.

JMO.

Thank you, will look into Monreale. We are flying from Rome after 3 nights there, hopefully no jet lag by then. What town would you recommend to stay overnight when visiting Etna and Taormina?

Dump Naxos, spread the time amongst the rest. Etna looks best from far away.

You've told us nothing about your interests or goals, so it's hard to say .... but I tend to agree with bilboburgler.

But you're leaving in < 10 days !?!? (Sorry I missed that before.) I think you may simply have to go with whatever you can find. And if that happens to be Giardino Naxos, well, at least there's a beach for your children.

Good luck!

I don't know the ages of the children, but if you take a young child to the Vatican Museums, she won't see much but the backside in front of her, unless you carry her on your shoulders.

One museum that delighted my granddaughter was the Galleria Doria Pamphili. It has an excellent audio guide in English narrated by a descendant of the powerful Renaissance family, who mentions roller skating in the galleries with his cousins as a child. The palace has the family's art collection displayed, and is furnished in the style of the various periods the Doria Pamphili family lived there. I believe some of them still live there; at least they did the last time I was there, about 10 years ago.

https://www.doriapamphilj.it/roma/

We just spent two weeks in Sicily in May - Palermo, Agrigento, Piazza Armerina, Modica and Siracusa/Ortigia, and that felt very rushed. We did not get to Monreale due to a timing conflict. You may want to check on the current state of restoration work going on there. I had read that there is scaffolding obscuring some of the mosaics, and a local guide also told us that we might not be able to have the full experience there. There are other stunning mosaics in Palermo at Cappella Palatina and La Martorana, as well as in the Cefalu Cathedral (although it too has scaffolding and restoration work going on). We could have skipped Cefalu - it's a pretty town but was packed with people on the day we went. Visiting the Valley of the Temples on a drive from Siracusa to San Vito lo Capo sounds like a really long day, and likely to be hot in the middle of the day. As kja says, it's a huge site, and there isn't a lot of shade. We went late in the day, past the peak crowds and heat.

If you have two nights in the Siracusa/Ortigia/Ragusa area, how would you divide the time? Does staying 2 nights at Ragusa or Modica make more sense than staying in Siracusa/Ortigia? My wife doesn't seem to be convinced Siracusa/Ortigia are worth visiting. So exploring other options on the south east side. Trying to avoid two one-night stays at Ragusa and Agrigento, as a tradeoff for the long drive.

For me, Siracusa (staying in Ortigia) hands down. I had 3 full days there and wish I'd had 4. But I don't think you've told us what interests you.

I would not miss the Villa Casale.

If useful, here are trip reports from a trip to Sicily last year:

Palermo, Sicily

Siracusa (Ortigia), Sicily