Grand Canal in Venice

We are just back from a magnificent two week trip to Italy. While I’m still recovering from jet lag and dealing with the laundry mountain, I want to start to share the trip with you. Be patient with me, dear reader! After 2 weeks away, I have lots to tell you, so I have many posts planned.

For today, I want to give you an overview of our trip. We decided to go with an escorted tour, which meant the tour company was responsible for arranging our air and train travel, hotels and transportation to and from airports and train stations. We then chose some specific guided tours of things we wanted guides for. The rest of the time we were on our own.

Venice

Our trip began when we arrived by plane at the Venice airport. Our guide met us and took

Florence from the Piazzelle Michaelangelo

us by water taxi to our hotel. We spent 3 nights in Venice and explored the Rialto Bridge, the Grand Canal, San Marco, Doge’s Palace (guided tour of these last two), the island of Murano, and many little corners of Venice. We took a gondola ride that was almost surreal feeling. Our guide took us by water taxi to the train station at the end of our stay.

Florence

We enjoyed the train trip through Tuscany (I would love to go back and explore the countryside). Three nights in Florence were wonderful. Our guide met us at the train station and took us by van to our hotel, on the banks of the Arno. We explored the Ponte Vecchio, Pitti Palace, and took a guided tour that took us by bus to the Piazzelle Michealangelo (for the view) then to the Duomo and the Accademia where we saw the David. We took a train on our own to Pisa for an afternoon to climb the leaning tower. My husband managed to sprain his ankle coming down, so we didn’t get to explore the town.

Spanish Steps in Rome

Our Florence guide took us back to the train station from our hotel.

Rome

The train ride to Rome was relaxing and we had our first glimpse of the Mediterranean on the way. Our guide brought us to the hotel for our three night stay. Rome was a magnificent city. We explored the Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain (where we threw coins in) and took guided tours of the Vatican and ancient Rome. We also visited the Pantheon. Our guide took us to the train station.

Sorrento

We traveled by train to Naples , where our guide met us and took us to Pompeii. Once there, we had a private guided tour of these impressive ruins. Our guide then drove us to

Sorrento harbor

Sorrento for our 3 night stay, and we enjoyed the stunning views of the Bay of Naples, Mount Vesuvius and the mountainous Amalfi coast. We took an all day guided tour to the island of Capri (this was quite a day and involved 4 buses and 4 boats) where we went to the Blue Grotto and traveled up to Anacapri. On another day, we explored Sorrento’s seaport and swam in the Mediterranean with Mount Vesuvius behind us. Our guide took us to the Naples airport and we flew home from there.

It was the most memorable vacation we’ve taken, I think and my mind is swimming with all the experiences. There was lots of good food (there was only one really bad meal the entire time), I did some great shopping, we took some beautiful photos, and we learned so much about Italy. I will be sharing all of that with you in coming posts. I kept a notebook this trip so that I would be sure to remember the things I want to write about.