Our stay in Italy would be shorter than France, so we pre-planned a bit more than we did for France. 2 full sight seeing days before we reached Rome were spent in Cinque Terre and a Pisa/Florence combo.
Cinque Terre
I first found out about Cinque Terre on pinterest (surprise, surprise) and fell in love with the photos. I knew I had to go there too. We stayed at a private home we found on airbnb that was about a 30-40 minute drive away. This saved us money and earned us more space in the home.
We drove to the second of the five towns, Vernazza, and parked our car. There's no way to drive into the towns, so accept the parking costs (which actually aren't that bad) and enjoy your day by walking and trains. The trains come and go in each town many times each day and for a low price take you from one town to the next.
For a Tuesday in mid-September, the towns were extremely crowded. I'm not sure what the formula is for avoiding crowds, but be warned...if the ferries aren't operating due to rough waters, the trains will be packed. And I mean shoulder to shoulder to shoulder packed.
Despite the trains, we enjoyed the day in the beautifully colored towns!
While here, I recommend shopping, eating pizza and gelato, and taking in the scenery. You can find hiking trails as well that go between the towns if you're interested in a more athletic day.
Our favorite town was Manorola, where we climbed to the top where a cliff-side restaurant served us afternoon cappuccinos. Can you believe this was our view?
Pisa
The next day, we headed out early for a trip to Florence with a pit-stop in Pisa. Thankfully I was traveling with seasoned Europeans, because they were able to suggest only spending lunch and some photo-opp time in Pisa. Some travelers may disagree, but the crown jewel of Pisa, the Leaning Tower, only takes a short amount of time to see.
It was a nice pit-stop with amazing pizza!
Did we do the standard holding-up-the-tower pic? No...but we had fun people watching those who did!
Florence
A quick drive later, and we were in Florence! Apparently, t-bone steak is a specialty in Florence (who would've known?). We'd had our fair share of baguettes and cheese and were ready for some meat. Ask your host or reception at your hotel where they recommend. Ours suggested a nice local stop that offered a bit lower prices. Our waitress taught us a good rule of thumb is to order 250g per person or split one steak (which is what we did).
After dinner, we walked to the center of town and did some night time sight seeing! We grabbed some gelato and listened to a local musician for a magical evening.
Though we probably could've spent the morning doing some more sightseeing, we needed to take off for our next stop...Rome!
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