thomo7

and for a historical perspective- I travelled in Italy with two girlfriends when I was 17, many many years ago. My friends were Italian although born in Australia so we had our 'tours' with their Italian family members.
My standouts were, the Alps near Sondrio, Bormio, and into Switzerland. Assissi, and in Rome, St Peter's,particularly the hike up the cupola (fantastic), the catacombs below and the Pieta, and even the glimpse of the outside of the collosseum!
I was enthralled with the way of life, which was so different to home, cows wandering the mountains with cowbells, wild blueberries and strawberries to pick.. and my shopping was for a few leather goods, and hand woven rugs, a great cheese knife, a bottle of Galiano and 10kg of swiss chocolate!!
My daughter travelled with a friend when she was 18 (a few years ago) and loved the Roman Holiday places )as mentioned earlier,the places mentioned in Da Vinci Code books, and loved Venice) bought some beautiful glass pieces. And the food is fantastic! I will be travelling with my husband and younger two children in October and hope to create heaps more fantastic memories, have a WONDERFUL trip!! JT

kwren

What they didn’t like:
1. Getting up

very funny! Sounds like home!

bellini

I took my daughter to Italy when she was 16. We stayed with some friends who live near Lago di Trasimeno in Umbria. She went everywhere with these friends and enrolled in 'The University of Life'. She loved hanging out in the student haunts in Perugia; got a craving for the gelati in Cortona, fell in love with Isola Maggiore (ferry from Passignano). Everything about Italy and things Italian, especially the food, enthralled her. She went back to the UK determined to study Italian at University.

suec1

Oh yes, the hike up the dome in St. Peter's is fantastic altho if you are going in the summer it might be scary hot - do it first thing if that is the case. But even if you don't hike all the way up the dome, take the elevator up to the "catwalk" that circles the inside - gives you a great perspective on how amazing the structure is and the view down is wonderful.

MFNYC

I think wayfinder was traveling with my kids! Her description of their likes and dislikes is right on the money. It could be any teenagers.

As far as museums in limited doses, the irony is my daughter ended up getting a BFA and now goes to museums whenever she can. So I guess those limited doses had their impact!

annhig

most of the above, plus

visiting the colosseum,

sitting on the terrace of our apartment looking at the colosseum,

the food [for our then rather picky 14 yr old DS, the food was a revelation]

being able to go out and buy breakfast for the family and bring it back to the apartment [with no italian at all!]

the transvestite show in Rome [click on my name for the trip report if you want a fuller description !]

Easter sunday mass in St. Mark's, Venice

hunting for the picture of the "ugliest baby" in galleries and museums

climbing almost anything

spremuta [freshly squeezed juice]

boat trips in venice

anything with squid or squid ink in it. [DS - he liked the way it turned his teeth black]

insalata caprese [DD].

shopping [DD]

Just like at home, really.

beaux

Balloon ride. www.ballooningintuscany.com

feda

Thomo7 I'm so thrilled that you mentioned the alps near Sondrio as some of your favourite spots in Italy since I'm from there and the area is probably still underrated from foreign tourists even though it's beautiful...When I go home from Milan if there are American tourists on the train they systematically get off at Varenna( maybe a reason why my area is off the beaten-path is that just before it there is gorgeous lake Como, so how could I blame tourists who stop there, but should they go just a bit norther they wouldn't be disappointed at all either.
So thanks you mentioned the area near Sondrio,northern Lombardy,which-by the way-is called Valtellina

kcnewby

Wow, so much to see and do. I have bookmarked everything and will definitely keep these close at hand. I am hoping that this inspires both my children to have passsion for travel and life. When youre so isolated in a country like Australia from all that Europe has to offer I think it means so much more.

kcnewby

Thought I would open this up again, we are going in September snd still interested in your thoughts. Im sure theres been plenty of travel since the last comments...

Agosto

I'm a teacher, and went to Italy with a group of students, aged 15 and 16. We visited Pisa, Florence and Venice, and the things they loved most were a gondola ride and the Leaning Tower of Pisa. We were lucky enough to be able to climb it, and all the kids mention it as one of the favourite things.

And they also loved giant icecreams in the Piazza de la Signoria, in Florence. One of the girls got a cone with 10 scoops!

LauraLF

I'm in the middle of my trip report now but our boys just loved seeing all the things they've studied in school. It is fun to see all those remarkable things in person. History becomes more fascinating for them.
Also , they love interacting with the Italian people who were so gracious and lovely the whole trip.
They enjoyed train travel as well, we took a day trip tp Pompeii and to Florence.
And the food and gelato!
Finally, I had heard peolple say it but just "hanging out" in Piazzas was very cool for them.

kwren

Piazza Farnese in Rome was so energetic one evening in Rome. There was an outdoor band and kids were dancing in the streets. My daughter loved watching it all.

My daughter also enjoyed going to the cat sanctuary in Rome - not just looking at the ruins, but going down into the offices where cats are fed and disabled cats are housed. It really made an impression on her.

Palazzo Valentini-Domus Romani is a great place to go. I highly recommend that for the kids...the whole family.

karens

Im Rome, my boys liked the Colosseum and Pantheon. My sons were never thrilled about visiting churches, but my older son said that Sant Ignazio was the "real deal". He also like the Gesu. Most of the time, my husband and he would hang outside while I went in to the churches to look around. But this trip, my younger son wanted to come in each church with me. I'm not sure why - perhaps it was b/c they were cooler, perhaps he liked the quiet after the bustle of Rome. But he was happy to sit and take in the ambience of each church we visited.

My older son thought the lively Campo de Fiori was so neat to explore - he went out one night by himself. He also really liked that he could drink at 18 in Rome. He wasn't sure if he could get away with purchasing some wine or beer, and was tickled that he could.

For our Northern Italy trip, the Cinque Terre was a highlight. But not the walking paths. We went to the beach, and the boys discovered that they could walk to the end of hte beach, climb the cliffs about 15' to a ledge and jump in the water. They *loved* this - even my husband did this. I couldn't bear to watch; I buried my nose in a book on the beach while they did this.

We all also really liked Venice. The first views from the vaporetto down the Grand Canal: Wow. My older son admitted that the tromp l-oiel ceiling in a church in Dorsoduro was very cool. Here's a good example of how they liked wandering around here:

It was our first day and we arrived on an overnight flight where none of us got much sleep. We found our apartment, and the plan was that we would go to the San Marco Square, get some dinner, take a brief walk around the area and come back to the apartment for a very early bedtime. We were all pretty tired. On the way back to our apt., we got lost. We were walking over bridges, down narrow lanes and this was interestng but then we wanted to find our bearing and decided to just find the Grand Canal. We twisted and turned a bit more and saw water. Yay. Not so fast. We were soo lost - it wasnt' the Grand Canal - it was the other waterway - we were all the way up in Cannereggio! So we had to turn around and try to find our way back from all the way up there. My boys didn't complain once. (I might have complained once or twice, lol)

Gelato is a nice perk of Italy, too. My kids are not adventurous eaters, and we all liked being able to get *good* pizza wherever we were.

karens

<<the amazing thing about Rome is that there is so much else that we didn't see.

Oh, I agree. I've now spent the same amount of time in London, Paris and Rome. Witht hat time, I do think I was able to see nearly everything I wanted to see in Paris and London - we had a nice amount of time to explore and felt we really did get a chance to see a lot.

The same amount of time just seems too short for Rome. There are so many beautiful palazzos, so many ornate churches. We didn't do any short excursions in Rome, so that makes the list longer of what I'd still like to see.

annhig

He also really liked that he could drink at 18 in Rome. He wasn't sure if he could get away with purchasing some wine or beer, and was tickled that he could.>>

lol, karens, i really don't think that the italians care too much about the age of their patrons, when it comes to serving alcohol. in fact, when we went to Rome with our kids the first time [DD was 18 i think, DS 15] they were surprised that DS WASN'T drinking beer or wine.

i am not surprised that you think that there is still a lot to see in Rome. I have a friend who has been 50+ times and still says that he hasn't seen it all.

kcnewby

Our trip is exactly 7 weeks away and our teens are getting very excited! All these places are being noted and are all very helpful... thanks!

giesen5

This is such a great topic, wanted to add some tidbits from 2017.

My kids were 12 and 14. Of the five places we went, the kids would rate them this way:

1. Amalfi Coast - by far their favorite place. We stayed outside of Atrani and the kids could walk the road on their own to get to the beach.

2. Lucca - kids loved the "small" town, also more relaxing. We wished that we stayed a couple more days. Biking around the walls - they could do that on their own.

3. Venice - our first stop. We were so damn jet lagged even though we stayed up late that first day. it really took us 3 days to recover and by then it was time to go. We wish we had more time to explore. Kids liked getting lost.

4. Florence - what a beautiful place. my wife and I want to come back here alone. Kids liked it, especially seeing the David after I had gushed about it for weeks and weeks before we got there. Took a bike ride into the countryside, was a blast (Tuscany Bike Tours).

5. Rome - not a favorite, but it was hard because it was the last stop before Amalfi Coast and two weeks into our trip. It was really hot, mid 90's. We decided to bag the city one day and head out to the beach, but wouldn't you know it that it was a strike day. Colosseum was awesome, loved watching the vendors try to scam women with roses on the Spanish Steps and really enjoyed the Pantheon. Also paid for the early entrance to the Vatican/Sistine Chapel. That was so worth it.

I think that if we had started in Rome the kids would have liked it better. But when we talk about reconstructing the trip they said they would have cut Rome out completely.

I found that doing something active every 3 days was so important for my kids. They could only handle sightseeing so much. We did the bike trip, rented a boat for a day on Amalfi Coast (their #1 highlight), took the vaparettos all over Venice, went to a concert in Ravello. I did not realize the need then, but now I would have added more of these types of things to keep them moving. The beaches were great for them on Amalfi Coast. And of course we did eat lots of gelato, all the time. It was fun deciding where to eat gelato, after awhile my kids would pop into a store and come out and say, "no good, keep on moving."