Hi,<BR> I will be in Italy in a few days- an unexpected trip. Which part of Italy should I avoid? Which part might actually be nice during the winter? I'm trying to avoid the heaviest down pour. <BR><BR>From what I have heard from this post, most people had down pours in Rome and floods in Venice. Please help me plan my trip. Thanks.

From what I understand, this is the dry season in most places. There has been a lot of rain, particularly in Tuscany this season but it is unusual. Maybe its global warming.

Italy has &quot;moderate&quot; winters. Except on the mountains (where it can get really cold, obviously, but if you go on a mountain in winter you are likely to be looking for low temperatures and snow for skiing) the temperatures will never become too harsh. In norhtern Italy (off the mountains) you will find cold but not freezing weather, some rain but not too much; you will hardly find snow (last year we have had it only once, this year we han't had any yet). In southern Italy temperatures will be warmer: in Sicily it is not uncommon in clear and sunny January day to have a 20°C temperature around noon. On the whole, there is not an area of Italy that has particularly harsh weather. Downpours the whole year round, but they are &quot;downpours&quot; from our Itlaian point of wiew, while I am told that Usa weather can be far more extreme than ours, so they might just look like &quot;a bit of a heavy rain&quot; to a foreigner coming from the Usa. As for venice, the flods are just abonormal tides that happen the whole year round. Yet I must say that weather in the mediterranean area (southern Europe and Northern Africa) is hardly predictable. this both makes our weather forecasts less reliable and our American tourists more worried about bad weather than they ought to be ^_^.

I will send you some notes on Sicily if you are interested. You can e-mail me.

Thanks for your reply everyone. I appreciate the advice. I'm glad that January is actually dry season in Italy. I look forward to my trip, thanks.

We just got back and it was FREEZING!<BR><BR>We actually saw snow in Venice for about 2 hours. They were having an unusually cold front as the temps were about 38-40 degress even in Rome.<BR><BR>This weather isn't exactly perfect for sitting out at cafes but it'll still be fun. Just make sure you bring enough warm layers and have a really good pair of gloves and a scarf.