Italy

Rome Trip Itinerary

Day 1 :

• Reach Rome in Train
• US Embassy in Rome (Had to drop one family in our group there due to incident in Florence)
• Drive to Hotel and check in
• National Monument of Victor Emmanuel II. The monument holds the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier with an eternal flame from WWI – Also called wedding cake
• Late Lunch @ Grotta Azzurra
• Walking Rome streets in the afternoon
  • Palazzo de Giustizia – Court of justice
  • View of St.Peters Basilica from the bridge…
  • Piazza Navonna (Fountain of Neptune, Fountain of four rivers)
    
  • Pantheon
  • Piazza della Rotonda (In front of Pantheon)
  • Trevi Fountain (You have to put a coin to come back to Rome)
    
  • Spanish Steps
  • Republic Square

Tiring day walking in Rome. It was so hot and sweating. People every where and there was not even space to walk. One good thing was cold water every where near these Plaza’s. Piazza is nothing but Plaza.

Day 2 :

• Vatican Tour
  • Vatican Museum
  • St. Peters Basilica
  • St. Peters Square
• Roman Forums
• Colosseum
• Lunch
• Afternoon tour
  • CataCombe, San Callisto
    
  • St. Pauls Cathedral

Vatican tour was organized by the travel agency. We get to go early in the morning as early batch. After 10AM there will be long lines to enter in the St.Peters Basilica. Lines was so long it was all over the St.Peters Square. I would definitely recommend to do this with travel agency, so that it will be a good experience.

Colosseum : Scale is unimaginable. Reminded the Gladiator movie when we were there. Our guide was so knowledgeable, we spent good amount of time there.

St.Pauls Cathedral was beautiful inside with very calm environment. No many people and it was beautiful relaxing.

Day 3 :

• Hop on and hop off bus tour (Trevi Fountain, Wedding Cake and more stops)
  
• Half a day trip to Tivoli (Villa D’Este and Hadrian Villa)

Tivoli, was the place where the ancient Romans quarried the Travertine marble which was used in the construction of the famous buildings like the Colosseum.

Villa D’Este, built in the 16th Century for the Cardinal Ippolito D’Este (son of the famous Lucrezia Borgia) who had it built for himself when he became the governor of Tivoli.

There were more than 500 fountains in this estate..Villa D’Este, Tivoli.

Trip Dates : Aug 08,2011  to Aug 11, 2011

Day Trip to Pisa

• Bus trip from Florence
• Shops on the way to the Miracle’s square
• Miracle’s square
• Pisa Baptistery
• Cathedral
• Pisa Tower(bell tower)

We were not able to climb the Pisa tower. We need to reserve at least a day before and there was limited tickets.

Trip Dates : Aug 07,2011

Florence Itinerary

Day 1 :

• First class Coach in Train (TrenItalia) to Florence. (Venice to Florence  – 2 hours)
  
• Hotel (Boscolo Astoria) check in
• Lunch @SPizzico
• Walk through the streets of Florence
• Santa Maria Novella Chruch, Firenze
• Dinner @ an Italian Trattoria

After Dinner, we were walking back to hotel. We noticed couple of people were following us. We entered in to a shop close by. They also entered the shop and left after few mins. We stayed in shop for few more mins after they left and quickly came back to hotel.

We did some research before the trip about pick pocketing and gypsies. We did notice gypsies on the streets here. You need to be very careful with money and passports when you travel.

Day 2 :

• Walking tour of Florence
  • Duomo (250 steps to climb to the top)
    
  • Santa Maria del Fiore cathedral
  • Santa Maria del Fiore Bapistry
  • Michelangelo’s David and more art in the Loggia dei Lanzi in Florence.
  • Piazza della Signoria
  • Uffizi Gallery (Leonardo Davinci at the entrance)
  • Ponte Vecchio bridge
  • Santa Croce Church, Florence (Michelangelo & Galileo were buried in here)
    
• Lunch at Uffizi Gallery
• Hop in Hop off Tour

The Loggia dei Lanzi, also called the Loggia della Signoria, is a building on a corner of the Piazza della Signoria in Florence, Italy

One of the family in our tour got robbed in the hotel. They were right next to our room. In the afternoon when we are back from the tour, their room was robbed. Guess what, locker in the room was stolen. Thieves took the locker in the room in a roller bag. Seems like they walked out with roller bag out of the hotel. They had some money and passports in the locker. Also, some cloths etc in the roller bag. Tour agent helped them and planned to get the passports in Rome.

Day 3 :

•    Trip to Pisa

Trip Dates : Aug 05,2011  to Aug 07, 2011

Venice Itinerary

Day 1:

• Land in Venice airport (flight from Paris)
• 7 mins walk from Airport to pier
• Boat ride from pier to Hotel Bellini
• Check in to hotel
• Lunch at the Pizza
• Gelato for dessert
• Walk in the Venice streets in the afternoon

Day 2 :

• Walking tour
  • 24 hour Clock
  • Doges Palace
  • St. Marks Square Tower
  • St. Marks Basilica
  • Glass blowing factory & Mosaic tiles
• Lunch at St.Mark Square
• Walk along Venice Canals and Gondola
• Opera House
• Gondola Serenade (Long wait for the ride)
• Evening stroll at St. Marks Basilica
• Realto bridge

Day 3 :

• Grand Canal (Facts about Grand Canal – 3,800 m long, 30–90 m wide, with an average depth of five meters (16.5 ft).)
• Realto Mercato
• Murano , Burano  and Torcello Tour (Afternoon tour)

Trip Dates : Aug 02,2011  to Aug 04, 2011