Where to visit in Italy
 

We will be taking our teenage daughter to Europe next summer. We plan on spending a week in the Netherlands and a week in Italy. We love the bike riding and the countryside of the Netherlands. Would like to spend a couple of days in Rome, but then want to visit a less populated area. We love the beach also. Venice would be great, but we have found on previous trips that we get a little overwhelmed in the larger cities.

If you want to go to Venice, go to Venice. It's much less overwhelming than Rome.

If you want to explore the Italian countryside, will you rent a car or rely entirely on public trans?

What are your interests besides bike riding? Museums, art, historical/ancient sights, food/cooking, wine, local festivals ....?

There are some very pleasant small towns just south of Rome, for which we found pretty Sperlonga an ideal base....

http://www.pbase.com/isolaverde/slides_sperlonga

and:

http://www.pbase.com/isolaverde/lazio_more

You might like to try these tourist board leaflets - although they're all several years old now!

http://www.italiantouristoffice.se/sv/docs/71.pdf

http://www.italiantouristoffice.se/sv/docs/177.pdf

http://www.italiantouristoffice.se/sv/docs/179.pdf

http://www.italiantouristoffice.se/sv/docs/180.pdf

http://www.italiantouristoffice.se/sv/docs/186.pdf

Not sure about cycling, but we were able to get around quite easily on the local buses and trains!

Peter

Ooops - two more:

http://www.italiantouristoffice.se/sv/docs/81.pdf

http://www.italiantouristoffice.se/sv/docs/82.pdf

Hope they all still work?

P

Agree about Sperlonga...love the place. Also Gaeta. But I'd advise having a car, even though you can get there by train, as there are many interesting inland venues to visit when you've tired of the beach.

about 150 ams north of Rome on the southern tuscan coast is the little known town of Orbetello. if you look on google maps you'll find that it's a in a lagoon at the end of a causeway - which means that there are plentiful beaches which can easily be reached by bicycle. i was there for a week on a language course and there was plenty to do - swimming, cycling, visiting the many castles of the area, eating seafood on the coast, etc. etc.

a little further afield we visited Pitigliano and the thermal baths at Saturnia. you could even get to siena for a day trip if you had an early start.

the train goes from Rome to Orbetello and you could just use bikes to get around but a car would probably be better.

If you want to ride in Italy there are two obvious areas, the Po valley and the Puglian Murge. Of these the PO valley has some lovely smaller cities. Have a look at http://www.mybikeguide.co.uk/Verona_Guide.php

Ferrara is also very nice in this area.

If you go to Puglia (aAmericans tend to call this area Apulia if this helps) then the high points are castles and greek temples which you will not get to see in the usual triangle of Venice, Florence, Rome.

I'd recommend Bolsena - a charming little town on a lake a few hours north of Rome, lots of places to visit in the area, especially if you have a car.