From the Forum to the Faraglioni.
Which Colosseum ticket actually puts you on the arena floor. Whether the Amalfi day trip out of Rome is worth fourteen hours. Where the Chianti tour stops for lunch. Priced, rated and reviewed.
The arena, the marble, the buried city, the cliff road.
Six bookings shape almost every first trip to Italy, and each one is sold half a dozen different ways. Here is what actually separates them.
Rome, Florence, Venice, and the two southern days people forget.
The order almost every first itinerary lands on, and the two southern days that turn it into a proper trip.
Pompeii
Amalfi Coast
Siena & the hill townsIn Rome, the ticket you buy decides the day.
All Rome tours →
The Colosseum sells four different mornings under one name and the Vatican sells five. These three carry the most travellers; the full list splits the rest by what you actually get once you are through the gate.
Colosseum, Forum and Palatine on one ticket
One guided sweep of the arena from the tiers, then up onto the Palatine to look down over the Forum. The standard combination; no hypogeum, no arena floor.
Vatican Museums, Sistine Chapel, St Peter’s
Kilometres of galleries funnel into one chapel and then out towards the basilica. Early entry is a fixed number of places each morning; the standard queue can run the length of the wall.
Pompeii and the coast, there and back
Rome to Pompeii, Positano and Sorrento between breakfast and dark. It works, and it is a coach day — pick it when there is no second week to give the south.
What everyone else in Italy is booking.
Every review →The tours that take more travellers than anything else on the peninsula, and what each one is like once the guide starts talking.
1
Vatican: Museums & Sistine Chapel Entrance Ticket
Skip the ticket line to the Vatican Museums and Sistine Chapel with a timed entry and optional audioguide at Viale Vaticano.
From · $38
Read our review →
2
Colosseum, Roman Forum & Palatine Guided Tour
from $78
3
Cathedral and Duomo’s Terraces Entrance Ticket
from $30
4
Doge’s Palace Reserved Entry Ticket
from $41
5
Vatican Museums, Sistine Chapel & St Peter’s Basilica Guided Tour
from $22
6
Colosseum, Palatine Hill and Roman Forum Guided Tour
from $52
7
Guided Tour of Colosseum, Roman Forum & Palatine Hill
from $55
8
Skip-The-Line Uffizi Gallery Timed Entry Ticket
from $30
Venice empties at five, when the day boats leave.
The Doge’s Palace, the glass furnaces out on Murano, the cicchetti counters behind the Rialto. The city the day-trippers never meet starts about the time they queue for the ferry home.
Three things Italy does that nowhere else can.
Old towns and cathedrals are everywhere in Europe. A sidecar through Rome at seven in the morning, a rowing boat into a cave lit from underneath, and a valley that still builds Ferraris are not.
The Vespa Morning
The Vespa here is not a rental gimmick: the tours run as guided convoys out through the Tuscan hills, or as sidecars with a driver around Rome before the traffic wakes. Most stop for coffee or a long lunch, and the sidecar versions ask nothing of your licence at all.
- 1Florence Vespa Tour: Tuscan Hills and Italian Cuisine★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 4,019 reviews
- 2Vespa Sidecar Tour By Night with Pickup★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,803 reviews
- 3Rome Morning Vespa Sidecar Tour in Rome with Cappuccino★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,771 reviews
The Blue Grotto
The cave on Capri glows because the sunlight comes in underwater and returns up through the sea. Entry is by small rowing boat, lying flat to clear the mouth, and it shuts the moment the swell rises — which is why every honest trip sells the grotto as optional and means it.
- 1Exclusive Capri Boat Tour and Optional Blue Grotto★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 3,170 reviews
- 2Capri Blue Grotto Small-Group Boat Day Tour From Sorrento★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 2,511 reviews
- 3Island Boat Tour with Blue Grotto Stop★★★★★★★★★★ 4.1 · 2,071 reviews
Motor Valley
Within an hour of Bologna, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Ducati and Maserati are all still building cars. Maranello keeps a museum on the factory doorstep and Sant’Agata another for Lamborghini; the combined tickets pair them into one day out of Bologna or Modena.
- 1Ferrari Museum Entrance Ticket★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 1,505 reviews
- 2Maranello and Modena: Ferrari Museums Combo Tickets★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 994 reviews
- 3Ferrari Museum and Fiorano Track Combo Eco Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 515 reviews
Florence is small. Tuscany is why you stay the week.
The David and the Uffizi are a morning each and both sell timed slots. The rest of the week is the road out — Chianti cellars, the walled hill towns, Pisa on the way to the water.
All 333 Florence tours →
Book these before you fly to Italy.
Most of Italy can be booked the night before from a hotel lobby. These cannot. They run on timed slots, capped numbers and closing days that take no notice of when you land.
- 01Da Vinci’s Last Supper Guided TourFifteen minutes, a few dozen people, and the release runs months ahead. There is no ticket window at the church door.
- 02Colosseum Underground Small Group Guided TourThe hypogeum and the arena floor are capped and sold apart from the standard Colosseum ticket — the standard one will not get you down there.
- 03Skip-The-Line Uffizi Gallery Timed Entry TicketTimed entry, and the gallery closes on Mondays. In high season the good morning slots go weeks out.
- 04Timed Entrance Ticket to Michelangelo’s DavidThe Accademia sells the David by the slot and also shuts on Mondays. The queue outside is the people who did not book.
South of Naples, the ferry timetable is the itinerary.
Positano and Amalfi are an hour apart by road and forty minutes by sea, and the road loses every time two coaches meet. Capri runs on ferry times; the grotto runs on the swell.
- 1Sorrento, Positano and Amalfi Full-Day Tourfrom $107
- 2Sorrento, Positano & Amalfi Coast – Small Group Tourfrom $76
- 3Pompeii, Amalfi Coast, and Sorrento Day Tripfrom $79
What a day out in Italy actually costs.
Every tour on the site, cheapest first. Entry tickets come in under the cost of lunch in Florence; the chartered boats are another conversation.
Timed entry tickets, street-food walks, pasta classes and the lagoon boats. Most of Italy, most days.
The full days out: Pompeii and the coast, Chianti with lunch, small-group galleries, jeeps up Etna.
Private guides, chartered boats and the once-a-trip days you will still be describing at home.
Italy eats at nine and sings until midnight.
All evening experiences →
Pasta Cooking Class Near the Colosseum with 3 Spritz Cocktails
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Santa Monaca Church Italian Opera Concert Ticket
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A wet week in Rome is a gallery week. So is one in Florence.
Autumn and winter rain here is ordinary, and the answers are all under a roof: a kitchen with a rolling pin, a gallery with a timed ticket, a cellar under a palazzo. None of them cancel for weather.
By region — where are you based?
Rome690 tours
Florence333 tours
Venice221 tours
Naples & the bay157 tours
Milan134 tours
Sicily32 tours
Sardinia24 tours- Every town and region →
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