Suggested Tour Routes to make the best of your holiday in Italy
Map of Italy with major cities
A Suggested Route around Italy
A comprehensive tour of Italy would take a long time, and if limited to the usually visited sights would omit many interesting experiences. However, here is my offering, and I’d say this was a 24 day minimum (excluding Rome):
Note: links to the towns go to photo albums on the TravelSignposts website
Rome – Cerveteri/Tarquinia – Viterbo – Orvieto – Siena – San Gimignano – Florence – Pisa – Carrara – Portofino (Cinque Terre) – Genoa – Milan – Stresa (Lake Maggiore) – Como – Verona – Bolzano – Cortina d’Ampezzo – Brenta Canal – Venice (NOT Mestre) – Pomposa – Ravenna (St Apollinare in Classe) – Perugia – Assisi – Castel Gondolfo – Frascati – Pompeii – Sorrento – Capri – Positano (Amalfi Coast) – Bari – Matera – Castellana – Alberobello – Lecce – Taranto – Calabrian Mountains – Taormina – Syracuse – Ortygia Island – Piazza Armerina – Enna – Selinunte – Agrigento – Mondello – Palermo – Naples – Monte Cassino – Rome
Most of the standard Europe tours cover roughly the same major highlights, but miss out Sicily, the Genoa section, one or both of the Italian Lakes and Dolomite sectors, and the southeast sector round Alberobello. Distances are not huge and roads are good, so in many cases it would easily be possible to change the order I’ve given above without major difficulty.
Don’t know where a place is? Try this map from Google:
Other Italy pages:
Travel to Italy for more than a Roman holiday!
When to travel to Italy for your tour: weather and seasons
Useful facts, dates and links to help you plan your tour of Italy
Food in Italy: a brief gastronomic tour
Book your sightseeing tours or day-trips in Italy online
Book your hotel in Italy online
What are you going to do with this information right now?
We are bringing three children with us to Italy, first time for all of us. Two are college age, one high school. Would like to start in Rome, then hit Florence, and Venice by train, then fly to Barcelona for a few day then home. We will be going in December, we want to tour and not do a beach vacation like usual. Any ideas or suggestions?? THANKS so much!
Dear Janet,
Apologies for the slow response. We’ve been travelling in China for a month (not reliable, safe internet) and after which I’ve had to dash to Singapore to attend to family matters.
As you’ve never been to Italy before, you’ll definitely enjoy your holiday there. There’s so much to see and it very much depends on what your interests are. I would suggest that you take a look at the tours offered by Viator, just to get an idea of the must-sees for your family.
https://www.partner.viator.com/prodSearch.jspa?destinationID=511&destinationName=Rome&PUID=2494&setLocale=en
https://www.partner.viator.com/en/2494/Florence/d519-ttd
https://www.partner.viator.com/en/2494/Venice/d522-ttd
The first thing I suggest you do in each city is to do a Hop-on Hop-off tour. They take you to all the main attractions. Stay on the bus for the whole circuit first to get a feel for the place and then you can decide on which attractions you must see. You’ll not cover all the attractions in the one visit which gives you an excuse to come back again.
I hope that this is helpful in getting your research started. I’m happy to provide any further comments once you’ve decided on what your priorities are.
Happy planning.
Kind regards,
Helen