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Free time in Rome, Florence and Venice
My wife and I will be on the May 18th Classic Italy tour. We are looking forward to our visit. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to spend our free time in Rome, Florence or Venice for those of you that have visited these cities in the past? One of my friends suggested the Galileo museum in Florence . I think we might spend sometime there as I don't think it's very far from the Westin in Florence and I think it may be something we would both enjoy.
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A Google search will yield tons of ideas.
We are on the May 22 Classic Italy, Small Groups tour, but believe the itineraries are essentially the same. We should arrive in Sorrento in the early afternoon, two days early so just plan to chill and possible explore near the hotel for the remainder of the first day. A car and driver will take us to Herculaneum, the National Archeological Museum in Naples, and the Anfiteatro Flavio (colosseum) and other sights in Pozzuoli on the second day, and a guide will escort us around Capri during the day before the welcome dinner.
There doesn't appear to be as much free time in Rome, so we haven't planned anything special. As I understand it, the Colosseum ticket provided by Tauck also gets you admission to the Roman Forum so we will likely go there during the afternoon of Day 5.
We have reservations for a Segway tour during our first free afternoon in Florence; the next day a car and driver will take us to Pisa.
I figure we will be pretty tired by the time we get to Venice. We may take the Vaporetto to the small islands of Murano (blown glass factories) or Burano (less touristy w/quaint, colorful houses) and stroll around or just stroll the area nearer our hotel.
Where are you locating the car/drivers for your excursions? We are on the Lakes, Venice, Florence, Rome tour beginning May 10. We will stay an extra day in Rome and want a driver for that day. We are thinking of going to Tivoli to see Villa d'Este in the morning and perhaps some additional things in Rome in the afternoon. There are options on the internet, but some gudance would be appreciated. We are so looking forward to the trip. Happy travels to you.
Nancy
I am using DriverinItaly. Nial D., another regular on this forum (ndvb), recommended them to me. He has used them extensively in recent years in Italy and other countries. They offer a bunch of standard tours & services, but will also arrange custom excursions and they just recently announced they are now a full service tour operator in the Med.
Their reviews on TripAdvisor are excellent. They are headquartered in Rome. I have been dealing with them via email and phone (they have a toll free US #). They are easy to work with and their written and spoken English is better than many Italian companies offering similar services. Just Google them. I booked with them months ago but it still may be possible at this late date.
Alan,
Thanks for the response. I'm well aware of google and TripAdvisor and use both extensively. However, I'm not real sure how much free time we really have in the cities I listed. We did receive our Tauck travel instructions and itinerary yesterday and it gives a brief overview of each day. I was hoping that perhaps someone who has previously been on the Classic Italy tour could chime in with a little advice based upon their experience. We will be arriving in Sorrento a day early and already have a tour scheduled to Capri the morning and afternoon before the welcome dinner. Thanks again for your response and I hope you have a safe and wonderful trip.
I think limited time you have in Rome will make it tough for outside activities, but Florence should be no problem. We checked with Tauck and though I can't find the specific info, I believe Tauck-directed activities end by noon each day. You should have enough time for just about anything you want to do in the each afternoon in Florence. If you are interested in Pisa an alternative to a car and driver is Viator. They run a half-day tour in the afternoon from Florence to Pisa. The threads at these links contain more info, including input from previous Classic Italy travelers:
Classic Italy- Pisa?
Pisa- Take two