I knew visiting Italy in July would be busy, and it was. It was not so busy, however, as to prevent us from thoroughly enjoying our trip. It was also hot. We knew we would sweat, and we did. The weather relented slightly for some of the time we were in the country, but we didn’t tour a single city where it was not very hot in the afternoon.

We allocated more of our time to Rome than the other cities we visited. We didn’t have time to get to Genoa, Florence, Sicily, Lake Como, or many other great places. We were able to do a pretty good job of seeing the things we were most interested in visiting in Rome, Naples, Venice, and even Milan. While staying in Rome, Stephanie and I spent two days day tripping to other sites around Lazio – the larger region of Italy that is home to Rome. Those sites – Ostia Antica and Tivoli – got their own article. We spent a day in the Vatican while in Rome as well. Since the Vatican is its own country, it has a separate page, too. I tried to cram all of the rest of the things we visited in the city of Rome into one article. It’s kind of long, but I spaced it out with a lot of pictures. There were plenty of things to photograph everywhere we went in Italy. These articles are ordered geographically, not chronologically. The order of our visits to places like the Colosseum and the Vatican had more to do with when tours and slots were available than anything else. 

Naples got its own article below, despite the huge photo drop from Pompeii and Herculaneum. We visited both of those archaeological sites from Naples. Venice and Milan each also have a dedicated article. You can link any of those from the tiles below.

As you might expect, our visit was weighted pretty heavily on historic sites. I suppose that is what you get when the chief trip planner has a history PhD. This may also be a bi-product of my having more general interest in visiting places than Stephanie, as well. When I learn about Italy, I naturally think of and remember places I know for their historical significance. Being a historian and knowing the historical narratives behind the places I visit only enhances my appreciation of those places. It makes my trips all that much more interesting. It helps me know what questions to ask. It helps me understand more when there are no guides or signs.

There are plenty of other places in Italy with historical significance. The ones I selected, though, are chock full of history and also easy to get to via trains. Rome and Milan were the bookends of the trip because that’s where the available flights went. I initially divided the number of days between the cities we would visit roughly based on how much I thought there would be to see in the area. It proved to be a pretty solid time distribution, despite my constant feeling that I hadn’t seen everything in a place when we left.

Follow the tiles below to see photos and read about what we saw in the different places around the Italian boot.