Travelling to Italy...Recommendations?

[JonnyCinco]

Just found out Uncle Sam does need as much money for his rent this year.....so we decided to go to Italy. In September. What's that you say? MotoGP is in San Marino in September? Is it? Well, yes it is...guess I may stop by!!!!!


Anyways, we are planning to fly into Venice, then drive to Bologna, check out ducati, hit up Rossi in Rimini, then over to Florence, and end up in Rome. Any recommendations whil there? We have never been to Europe, so looking for any suggestions.

Zoom Zoom!

 

[dcstrom]

Sounds like a good plan - how much time do you have? Are you on a budget? Some time around the hill towns of Tuscany would be good, great food and wine, if on a budget you can find cheap accommodation at some of the monasteries. Misano MotoGP should be fantastic, but crazy and probably expensive. If staying around there you want to book now. If you don't have time to spend sightseeing on the way to Rome, you might be better renting the car in Venice, dropping it in Florence, and getting the train to Rome from there.

here's the details on Misano

http://www.motogp.com/en/events/San+Marino/2012

Cool, I didn't know the address was "via Daijiro Kato" - nice gesture.

Trevor

 

[JonnyCinco]

Budget...Within reason. Ya only live once as they say. Not going Casino Royale style, but want to enjoy ourselves.

As for the MotoGP, I have an email into them to check out their VIP village, as their website blows for know the difference and pricing. We will be booking our flight later this week. Looking at arriving Sept 8 and departing September 22.

Turning the car in at Florence is a good idea. Will have to check that out.

Keep'm coming

 

[dcstrom]

http://www.reidsitaly.com/planning/lodging/monasteries.html


Good way to get a taste of a different culture within a culture... even if you are not religious they are interesting, if not always the most comfortable. Be careful with the Nunneries, the lock the front gate at 4pm! (well, at least the one we had hoped to stay at did). If you don't have reservations it's always good to have a Plan B.

 

[rem]

When in Rome .... ::008:: R

 

[sasosr]

R: Travelling to Italy...Recommendations?

If you need same info...i live in sicily but my wife and i went in toscana-umbria-san marino and rome by our old ktm adv. Nice posts but very expansive! If you schould come in sicily...i' here

Inviato dal mio GT-I9003 usando Tapatalk

 

[sportrider]

You should visit Parma while your there and btw, here's my ecu to take with you.

 

[Checkswrecks]

Whether along the coast or the ridge down the ridge that is the center of the country, I try to stay off the autostradas (highways). They are efficient but expensive, boring, and heavily patrolled.



I'm not a big fan of the cities, beyond the artsy-historic stuff. I've never worried for personal safety, but use common sense and thievery for vehicles and stuff in them is serious. For navigating, a GPS with Euro data is great, but stuff comes so fast, that long ago I learned to pick a direction, stop to re-orient, then adapt. I do fine without a gps and it's one less thing to worry about.


The charm of Italy is just pulling into whatever little Inn that you find for a night, or some little town square for a meal, then asking the local for what is interesting. They ALL know of something interesting to see and would LOVE to tell you. I like the back roads along the spine, especially if on a rented bike. Orvietto is a bit touristy but really cool, there's the monastery on the pinnacle, whose name I'd have to look up, etc. Maybe swimming at the black sand beach of Lago Bolsano, some local wine and star watching? Oh - another fun diversion is asking the LOCALS where the best wine is; every one will have a different answer.




Piza is not worth the time imho. Rome is really easy to rent motorcycles at and a scooter makes seeing the Rome sites a WHOLE lot easier and more efficient because there are so many of them. I posted this several years ago about renting there: http://advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=520488&highlight=biztripping There's a pretty national forest NE of Rome that is a nice get away.


Checks

 

[Rasher]

How about some time in the Alps?

There are a number of bike hire places so you could even ride a few top passes ::008::

I can recommend many if you decide to add this to your agenda, of course you could drive up a couple in the car, but it ain't the same, although the beauty of the place makes it worth a detour even if your stuck in the tin box.

Oh, yeah - check out the fuel prices before you set off so you have time for them to sink in!

 

[Twisties]

We preferred Lucca and Montalcino in the Tuscan Hill Country. Small walled medieval city states. The bigger blockbuster location, Florence, was a bit much for us. Sienna makes a nice intermediate sized destination with a very nice Duomo (cathedral). We saw lots of sport riding around Voltarra and Castel San Gimignano. Montepulciano was a zoo and we bailed out without stopping.

From Lucca we drove north towards Castelnuovo di Garfagnana, then, just by sight, up to some of the pianos (hillside/mountainside towns above the valley). These proved to be rarely visited and although they were without services we very much enjoyed walking around them and talking to the locals who were delighted to see us. We were in a cage, but I was totally panting for a bike up in this area.

We also enjoyed Milan, in a sort of NYC/Greenwhich Village sort of way. Castello Sforzesco (if nothing else, you must hear an Italian pronounce this name) is the city museum of Milan. In it you may find yourself alone with a completely unassuming Michelangelo piece. We certainly preferred the more intimate, less crowded and less well known venues, such as this one. The castle itself is a bit more modern than much of Italy, if I recall dating to about ad 1500. But the frescoed ceilings are a joy, as are the courtyard windows.

We visited the Cinque Terre, Vernazza in particular. I will give it this: The most beautiful and scenic place I have ever been. The price being that it has gotten a little too popular for it's britches... a lot very unhappy tourists there in our observation. Planned properly it could work out. Walking between the Cinque Terre villages (had the Vernazzians not made it impossible for us to do so, as we had planned) seems like a very nice thing to do. All in all, I would avoid the Cinque Terre unless it seems like something you just couldn't miss.

We did not really like Rome as much as the other areas we visited. However, the Villa Borghese is another of those intimate museum venues, and it is overflowing with blockbuster pieces. I would put up with Rome just for that.

Here is a write up with links to pics I did in another forum.

http://bmwsporttouring.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=419765&Searchpage=1&Main=38791&Words=vernazza&Search=true#Post419765

 

[JonnyCinco]

tickets booked. Land in Venice on Friday 9/7. Leave Rome 9/22!!