re: Just booked flight to Rome in October.

You can easily take the train from Rome to anywhere else in Italy. If you do multi city, look at flying out of Milan. I've always found fares to be cheaper out of MXP for whatever reason.

If looking for apartments, we've used Paris Perfect (And their local affiliates like Italy Perfect) for stays in Paris, Florence and Venice and they were great

Scavi tour is now booked.

10 days is enough to do Rome, Florence and Venice and you can take the train from one place to the other.

Rome is awesome. Tons of things to see. Great food. Just a fun time all around

quote:

---

I minored in Latin at LSU University many years ago.

---

Batinski?

Gellrich?

I went to Rome/Florence/Venice about 12 years ago.

Everywhere you turn in Rome is like stepping back a few centuries or 20 centuries.

Eat gelato every day.
Always get the Limoncello after dinner.

The Vatican is awesome, but very crowded with long lines.
We enjoyed going to many of the other cathedrals throughout Rome. All these cathedrals contain thousands pieces of art work. There were never a line or many people.

If you are not getting a rental car, get the hop on/hop off tour buses for the time you are in Rome. There are several companies and barter for a good price.

When in Florence, rent bicycles. It’s a lot smaller than Rome, and you can rent bikes for the extent of your time pretty cheap.

I would highly recommend visiting Cinque Terre. It’s about an hour train ride from Florence, and is one of the beautiful places I’ve ever been to. You can stop halfway there and see the Leaning Tower of Pesa, but it is super boring.

Here’s a photo I took in Cinque Terre

I would second the Cinque Terre. Spectacular scenery from the hiking trails.

But with 8-10 days the OP can't do everything.

Got back from two weeks in Italy on Sunday afternoon.

Flew out of ATL on 6/23 direct to Rome on Delta. Flight was delayed so spent a while in Skyclub(kids are $50 extra a piece with Amex platinum now...FYI). It was worth it though since we probably spent 3.5 hours in there.

Spent the afternoon/evening in Rome(absolutely packed)on Sat and Sun morning before a 2pm train to Naples. We stayed in a hotel right next to the train station, which was extremely easy and convenient. Transfer to our house in Masa Lubrense that was set up by our airbnb host. Amazing week in a hill side villa there. Our airbnb host set up all our excursions and transportation as well as restaurant reservations and he cooked for us twice. You absolutely do not want to drive on the Sorrentine Peninsula. The property was amazing. I think we had about 2.5 acres to ourselves. Olive trees, lemon trees, figs, pears, plumns, etc. I think half of what was growing was edible. A gardener showed up every day and kind of putzed around. He was an old Italian guy that didn't speak a work of English and took a ton of cigarette breaks. I probably would have done the same if that was my view.

First day was spent relaxing at the house with the pool with the kids looking out to Capri. The wives went to Sorrento to shop for a bit. Pompeii/Vesuvius the next day. Boat day on Wed. Amazing. If you go, you have to charter your own boat. Highlight of the week by far. Last day was a lemon farm/mozzerella farm visit, which was more enjoyable than I thought it would be.

Friday morning transfer back to Naples and train to Perugia. Spent the night in Perugia and on to our villa off Lake Trasimeno for week two. Rented a car in Perugia for daily outings from the villa. Assisi, Orvieto, Siena, Montepulciano/Montalcino, Lake Trasimeno. We'd always get back to the house by about 4 or 5 for a swim before dinner. The kids were spent by the end of the week, so we stayed at the house most of the last day. We went to Pasagnano sul Trasimeno for lunch, but came back and swam the rest of the afternoon before grilling some giant bone in ribeyes I found at the store, with a salad and roasted veg. Since we were pretty separated from local cities, we cooked dinner at the house every night other than one where we hired a chef in house.

Train back to Rome(96 degrees and even more crowded than 2 weeks prior) on Sat to fly out early Sunday. That was a long 18ish hours. Not sure that I stopped sweating the entire time. Up at 5:30 in Rome and to the airport by 6:30. ~10 hour flight back and landed at about 1:45 eastern. Used the Amex/Centurion lounge in Rome airport so we didn't have to spend another $100 on the kids in the Skyclub.


View from the porch in Masa Lubrense(That's Capri behind the tree and Ischia in the distance). The porch had an olive and carob tree growing in it, so you always had shade if you want -

LINK

View from the pool in Masa Lubrense. The pool edge on the water side was lined with olive trees, so more shade when needed -

LINK

View above the pool of the trees -

LINK

From the boat - a few steps to get down to the water

LINK

View of Trasimeno from house 2 -

LINK