ITALIA!!!!

A few years ago Matt and I decided that we would like to take a dream vacation to Italy. We kept putting it off for one reason or another until we heard that we might be moving to Europe. Shortly after finalizing our move in May I began research for our trip. We decided to go in mid-September, hoping to miss some of the scorching summer heat but still enjoy the weather. I put a lot of time and thought into planning our trip and while some things didn’t work out quite as expected, it was a great journey nonetheless.

We left London bright and early on Sunday, Sept 9th for Rome, traveled through Italy for 10 nights/11 days, and left Venice on Wednesday, Sept 19th to return to the U.K. To make traveling easier we only brought what we could fit into a rucksack on our backs. It was nice to get around that way, but it wasn’t as convenient to do laundry as we had hoped. Also, it limited the amount and size of souvenirs we could bring home. We had some ups and downs along the way (cultural differences), but are so glad we had the chance to explore the places we did.

Below is an outline of our trip. The pictures have also been loaded to our Web Album (about 800 of them), but are not yet labeled. Stay tuned for details of the individual cities and photo captions!


Rome : Roma
Dates: Sept 9-12
Lodging: Hotel Italia
Sightseeing:

• City Bus Tour
• Vatican City: St. Peter’s Basilica, Vatican Museum, Sistine Chapel
• “Caesar Shuffle”: Colosseum, Roman Forum, Palatine Hill, Mamertime Prison, Capitol Hill, Pantheon

Cinque Terre (Five Villages)
Dates: Sept 12-14
Lodging: Hotel Suisse Bellevue, Monterosso
Sightseeing:

• Cinque Terre Trail hike and coastal boat ride

Florence : Firenze
Dates: Sept 14-17
Lodging: Bellevue Hotel
Sightseeing:

• Science Museum
• Oltrarno Walk
• City Bus Tour, including trip to Fiesole
• Accademia (Michelangelo’s David)
  

Venice : Venezia
OUR FAVORITE CITY
Dates: Sept 17-19
Lodging: Hotel Riva
Sightseeing:

• Correr Museum
• Doge’s Palace
• Gondola Ride
• St. Mark’s Basilica
• Island of Murano
• Cruise Grand Canal
  

Recommendations before any European trip:

• Pick up a good guidebook or two. I highly recommend the Rick Steves collection, as well as his accompanying website, phrase books, planning maps, travel items. While $20-25 might seem a bit high, it is well worth it and will save you much more time, money, and energy if you invest in the right guidebook.
• Consult online websites for reviews on lodging, dining, sightseeing, etc. I highly recommend http://www.tripadvisor.com/ for personal traveler reviews and also suggest checking out the websites of cities, hotels, and attractions of which you are interested. Make reservations for main attractions as far in advance as possible. While it may not be your style to create a detailed itinerary, it is important to know when the attractions are open and what days are best for visiting. Some places require advance reservations.
• Invest in a good digital camera. We have a pretty decent digital camera for general pictures, but we wish we would’ve had a better one for indoors and nighttime photos.