Jealous. Why has no one mentioned shopping?? Take money for leather in Florence. Buy a little gold on the bridge. Forget Rome just spend days in the Florence museums. Sigh.
Have your locals tell you where to go for items that are not knockoffs or factory made.
Condé Nast had some ideas https://www.cntraveler.com/stories/2014-08-12/insiders-guide-to-shopping-in-florence
In June the academic year may be winding down. Some of the fashion schools may have runways or art studios having shows. It may be fun to attend one of those.
Edited to add- Girl in Florence blog has a piece on Real or Fake Shop Smart which is very useful for shopping.
http://www.italychauffeurservice.com - link to the drivers/tour guides I was talking about earlier.
Ooh - shopping! If you do go shopping for leather in Florence you should check out the Scoula del Cuoio. It is a school where the leather artisans learn how to craft everything from purses to jackets to wallets. It took us a little bit of time to find it (it is behind a church and we couldn’t write find the entrance at first) but it was so worth it. There are several rooms full of everything you can imagine - all handmade right there and at much better prices than you can find anywhere. Plus if you buy something you can have them monogram it for free and you can watch them do it - its very cool. I regret that I only bought a small purse, I would have love to get a lot more.
Another interesting place was a 600 year old perfume/cosmetic shop called Officinal Profumo Farmaceutica. It is next to a church by the Santa Maria train station. The inside is beautiful even if you don’t want to buy anything. S21 got some simple toner to bring home -lucky for me she rarely uses it so I get to steal it and the smell bring me straight back to that beautiful shop!
The fountains at Villa d’Este were one of my favorite things too.
This Stibbert museum in Florence was a surprise to me. It’s a very large private collection of art, weapons and Armor. It was a 30 minute cab ride away.
The Palazzo Pitti is well worth seeing in Florence. (It has a Wikipedia entry, which shows some of the totally remarkable paintings there–Raphael, Titian, Caravaggio). There are multiple sections of the collection (of different types, including costumes) with their own entry tickets, sold separately at the museum entrance, located at the base of the hill and the bottom of a very large number of steps. If you don’t have all of the tickets for the components that you want to see, you may have to backtrack a long way down multiple flights of steps and downhill, in order to buy new tickets. I would recommend that regardless of your time of entry, you purchase tickets for everything, unless you are quite young and spry.
I just noticed the relatively short time that you will be in Rome. In that case, the side trip to Ostia Antica is not a good idea, in my opinion. A trip to the Basilica San Paolo fuori le Mura (Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls) takes a while (since it is outside the walls), but I think it is worthwhile, and I would recommend it over the Church of Quo Vadis Domine, also somewhat off the beaten track. St. Paul’s is described as being “third in dignity of the churches of Rome.”
My husband and I really enjoyed the Da Vince museum in Florence. We had visited art museums almost daily during our three week visit to Italy so it was nice break to enjoy a museum that featured items other than art.
Can you tell that I am still upset with the ticket sellers at the Palazzo Pitti in Florence–even after I forget how many years?!
We went on Viator Tours of the Ufizzi in Florence and also of the Accademia Gallery (where Michelangelo’s David is displayed). I thought that these were worthwhile for several reasons. First, they avoided long waits in line for general admission. Second, the tour guides were knowledgeable and added a lot to the tour. This was especially true for the tour of the Accademia Gallery. Third, we enjoyed the company of the rest of the tour group.
The tour of the Ufizzi was shorter than I would have liked. They may offer a longer tour, or if you have time, you might go back to look around on your own. Fascinating information about the paintings that I would probably not have found was presented during the tour, though, so I would recommend a tour for at least part of the time at the Ufizzi.
As I recall, there is a fascinating sculpture museum more or less directly in back of Il Duomo in Florence. A paperback book on Brunelleschi’s Dome is available, and makes an interesting read before you go.
One of my favorite souvenirs of Florence is a cartoon-ish guide to art for children, written in Italian.
For science nerds, the Museo Galileo is utterly spectacular! It is wonderfully done. The displays would be fabulous even if the museum did not have the connection to Galileo. (Also, it has a great gift shop.)
We did not get to the da Vinci Museum, but it looks excellent. Also, there was a smaller museum that we hoped to tour, but it was closed in August–it slips my mind at the moment.
Did I mention the gelato? No, I didn’t mention it yet. But it is wonderful both in Florence and in Rome. I give a slight edge to the gelato we got in Florence.
I loved the Borghese museum, be sure to get tickets ahead of time.
There is a museum specifically for the Duomo, The Opera del Duomo Museum. It is located at the end of the Duomo. It houses the actual items from the Duomo and describes how it was built. This is where the actual “Doors of Paradise” are located. You can get a better and more up close view of the statues that are used to decorate the cathedral.
I would get the Florence travel pass. It allows entry to almost all the museums for one price. It also allows you to go to the head of the line for certain museums. I got all the tickets at once at the Palazzo Pitti. The website isn’t the greatest but you can see the list of museums, http://www.firenzecard.it/?lang=en.
Some monuments have more than one ticket. The Duomo has 4 separate tickets of which 3 are general admissions and one you have to sign up for a specific time. The Bapistery, the Bell Tower and the museum were each their own ticket and general admission, you can enter at any time it was open. To get to the top of the Dome in the Duomo, you had to get a ticket with a time
I also would recommend using the travel app IZI.travel. It uses GPS and as you get closer to a monument, it will turn on and tell the story. You can try now as it may have a guide for the town you live in. The app was tied in to the exhibits in the Palazzo Vecchio by the museum itself.
also make a determination of how good of shape you are in for walking 5-7 miles a day. The museum have tile floors and sidewalks are paved stones, both are unforgiving on the knees. Start walking now to get in shape if you need it. I always forget that running a few miles is not the same as walking 5-7 miles a day and all the standing.
Not sure if you know the gelato trick - don’t go to the places where the gelato is piled up in high mounds - it looks pretty but those are the touristy places. Go to the shops where the gelato is flat or slightly rounded like a normal ice cream shop.
We managed to eat gelato between 1-2 times every day except the day we went to the wineries. :)) Our absolute favorites were Perche No! in Florence (one of the oldest gelaterias there) and Gelateria del Teatro in Rome. In Rome we are there every day because it was one block from our apartment - so delicious!!
Reviving thread to check if any other posters have tips on things to do and places to go see while in Rome and Florence. I’ve been following this discussion and making notes since my family will be doing a tour of Italy and we wanted to check out all these wonderful tips.
Try to give yourself enough time to get lost and wander around a bit. We must have passed Trevi Fountain tons of times on foot. You see so much when you are walking.
The money belt under your clothing is a must gmfir securing your passport and valuables.
Find on PBS or a streaming service a documentary “The Great Cathedral Mystery.” It is about the construction of the Duomo in Florence. I will be looking at it with a new appreciation.
I like handbags from companies such as Travelon or Pacsafe. Gives me peace of mind in crowded tourist areas.
There is a monastery, perhaps, with the name of Malta in it. From the garden you can take a fabulous photo of the Vatican. A few minutes of googling should help. On my phone now so won’t try to look it up.
In Italy, I highly recommend checking out the enoteca culture. It can replace dinner for a lighter meal or can serve as a place to grab an apertif and a bite before heading to a restaurant, which can come in handy with Italy’s late dining hours. We often ate a big meal at lunch and just had a bite for dinner. Great way to try different wines.
In Florence, try Il Santino (enoteca) and its sister restaurant next door, il Santo Bevitore, both located in Santo Spirito which is a very nice area of Florence in the Oltrarno, the other side of the river and a good place to go to get away from the more touristy parts of the city.
http://www.ilsantobevitore.com/
Another great enoteca in Florence is Le Volpe e l’uva. Lots of great, artisanal charcuterie. Both the enotecas are tiny but welcoming.
https://www.levolpieluva.com/
As far as money belts, I think folks are divided into two camps/philosophies on them. We never use them. We just travel light. Leave the jewelry at home, bring a little cash and one credit card when you go out each day to use for that day. Easy to carry in an interior pocket. Be aware of your surroundings, of course. Many trips, zero problems.
@“Snowball City” that’s the Knights of Malta keyhole I think.
Read the recommendations in Rick Steves guide books.
For example, when there was a lonnnnnnnnng line at the Colosseum. The family was tempted to buy a skip-line ticket. But I knew to walk a short distance to another entrance (Palatine Hill, I think) that was on 3-site combo ticket also with Forum. There was one only person ahead of us at the Hill ticket booth. The kids had ribbed me all my consulting of old fashioned printed travel books, but they were impressed that day! (To be fair, at the next city I was impressed at DS’s superb cellphone/yelp research skills finding us a fantastic string concert performed in a Venice church).
For Rome-
How old are the people you are traveling with? I read a blog about a man who operates a gladiator school where the kids and teens can receive training in Roman combat. He works a fair bit of history into it too.
I can’t remember if I had mentioned previously that we had rented bikes in the giant park. We rode around looking at the statues and stopped to rent a row boat too. Even the HS sophomore was happy to have a fun afternoon break.
“Take money for leather in Florence.”
For sure!
We found that the closer you were to the area famous for a certain craft the cheaper it was. Florence is the leather place and it had the best prices.
Good article in the NYT from an Italian reporter on how her village is changing. Her generation left to get education and jobs in the cities. Migrants are filling the jobs in the vineyards and caring for older people. Lots of non Italian children in the school. She is hoping the Pakistani woman who used to be a doctor can get through licensing there because the village doctor is near retirement age.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/20/world/europe/italy-tuscany-migration-elections.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=second-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news