Would like help with where to go next...
 

We have plans to stay in Cinque Terre Italy from Sept 13-19. So from the 19-27 I don't know where to go. We are traveling by rail and my returning flight leaves from Milan. Have been to Lake Como, Lake Marjorie, Milan, Venice, Rome, Lucca, Pisa all the tourist stuff. I am kinda looking for that small town that's off the beaten track maybe in the mountains? That is not traveled by tons of tourist? I have no idea what to do, anything is better than what I have which is nothing. Thank you.

Lago Maggiore does not translate as Lake Marjorie. Maggiore means bigger, or major. Pronounced ma-jorr-eh.

From Cinque Terre, you might head northwest to a smaller town in Piemonte and/or a visit to Torino before heading to Milan.

My take is that the places not traveled by tons of tourists are special interest destinations for those with specific objectives. It is not clear from your descriptions if you are in this category.

If you look at a map of the region, you can identify many regions close to CT you have not been to. Piemonte, Emilia Romagna, Dolomiti, Southern Tuscany, and Umbria. Many are not necessarily small towns not traveled by tons of tourists. They are however, outside of "Taste of Italy" type of destinations.

San Gimignano is a really interesting little town. It's a medieval hill town with lots of towers and the best Gelato in Italy! There are tourists, but it's got a beautiful view, and interesting history, and even some pretty nice shops! It's about an hour away from Florence, up in the lovely Tuscan hills:). I was there for an afternoon in May, the tour group I was with went there as a special excursion:). Our tour guide invented his own excursions half the tour, all of which were well worth going on, and off the regular tour group schedule:)!

San Gimignano is a total tourist mecca, NOT what you are looking for. It's a very interesting town historically, but overrun with tourists in high season and not at all as interesting as a million other smaller Tuscan and Umbrian towns that people rarely visit.

Get a good map and find places that don't appear on the usual tourist circuits. Then go there.

Lago di Orta---magical !
www.orta.net

I would suggest Genoa and Camogli. You could also chek out Emilia-Romagna: Parma, bologna.

We just got back from Italy last month and one of our favorite places was Verona. We hadn't been there before (this was our 4th visit to Italy) and it was definitely a highlight.

Also loved our extended visit in Umbria a few years ago. We based ourselves near Bevagna and from there visited a lot of the surrounding towns. Some of the towns (Assisi, Orvieto) are touristy but other, smaller ones were delightfully uncrowded.

Tracy

Perfect... thank you to everyone. For once again, giving out wonderful advice!