Book the big fiveThe Colosseum, the Vatican Museums, the Duomo climb, the Uffizi and the Accademia sell out weeks ahead in May: book them as soon as you have dates.
Hours, prices, timetables and coordinates are from general knowledge; re-check them on the official sites before you go.
Seven days: the Pantheon and Trevi, the Colosseum and Trastevere, the Vatican and the train north, the Duomo and the Uffizi, David and the Oltrarno, Venice's canals and St Mark's, the Rialto before the flight.
Land at 10:00, the train to Termini. After lunch, the Pantheon, Piazza Navona and Trevi on foot, the Spanish Steps at dusk, dinner in Monti.
🗺 The whole day in Google Maps →about €14 each
Non-stop every 15 minutes, 32 minutes. Then a taxi to the hotel, about €12, or bus 40 to Largo Argentina. Lunch near the hotel.
A Roman temple of about 125 AD, later a church, whose concrete dome, 43 metres across, is open to the sky through a round eye at the top.
about €5 eachday's highlight
Stand under the oculus and look up; the light moves across the coffers through the day. Raphael is buried inside, by the left wall. Half an hour; the queue moves fast.
A long baroque square on the shape of a Roman stadium, with Bernini's Fountain of the Four Rivers at its centre.
free
Five minutes from the Pantheon. A gelato on the way at Giolitti or Della Palma. Then back to the hotel to rest.
A baroque fountain of 1762 spilling out of a palace façade, where a coin thrown over the shoulder means you will return; the Spanish Steps rise ten minutes north of it.
freepickpockets
Crowded at every hour; early evening is easier than midday. Walk on to the Spanish Steps and up to the church at the top for the view down Via Condotti.
€30–45 each
Rome's four pastas are carbonara, cacio e pepe, amatriciana and gricia. Monti, behind the Forum, has trattorie for each. Book for 20:30.
The Colosseum at a booked 9:00, the Forum and the Palatine after it, a rest at midday, sunset on the Janiculum and dinner in Trastevere.
🗺 The whole day in Google Maps →The amphitheatre opened in 80 AD for 50,000 spectators, where gladiators and wild animals fought; its underground passages and arena floor can be visited.
€18–24 eachday's highlighttimed slot
The ticket names a time for the Colosseum and is valid the same day for the Forum and the Palatine. The dearer one adds the arena floor, worth it for the view up at the tiers.
Walk the upper level for the Arch of Constantine below. An hour and a half.
The Forum was the centre of Roman public life: temples, law courts and the Senate house. The Palatine above it is where the emperors built their palaces.
same ticketno shade
Up the Palatine first, to the Farnese Gardens' terrace that looks down over the whole Forum; then down along the Via Sacra to the Senate house. Two hours; take water, there is little shade.
€15–25 each
Pizza al taglio, by the slice, or a supplì, fried rice with mozzarella inside. Back to the hotel until five.
The hill above Trastevere with the widest view over Rome's domes; a cannon fires from it at noon every day.
free
Taxi up, about €12, or a steep 25-minute walk. Sunset about 20:20 in early May. Walk down the stairs into Trastevere.
The medieval quarter across the Tiber: ivy on the walls, small squares and the 12th-century mosaics of Santa Maria in Trastevere.
€30–45 each
Book a trattoria; the ones on the main square charge for the view. Supplì, then carciofi alla giudia, fried artichokes, in season in spring.
The Vatican Museums at a booked 8:00 and the Sistine Chapel, St Peter's Basilica, lunch, then the 15:50 train to Florence and the Ponte Vecchio at dusk.
🗺 The whole day in Google Maps →The popes' collections, from Roman statues to the Raphael Rooms, ending in the Sistine Chapel, whose ceiling Michelangelo painted between 1508 and 1512, with the Last Judgment on the altar wall.
about €25 eachday's highlighttimed slot
Taxi to the entrance on Viale Vaticano; be there at 7:45. Go briskly through the Gallery of Maps to the Raphael Rooms, then the chapel before the groups. No photos inside it; you may sit on the benches along the walls.
Two and a half hours.
The largest church in Christendom, rebuilt from 1506 over Saint Peter's tomb, with Michelangelo's Pietà inside the door and his dome above.
free; dome €15–20shoulders covered
Through the square and the security line, 20 to 40 minutes. The Pietà is behind glass on the right. Climbing the dome, 551 steps or a lift and 320, gives the view down the whole of Via della Conciliazione.
€15–25 each
Prati, the grid of streets east of the Vatican, has better food than the streets by the walls. Then the hotel for the bags and a taxi to Termini.
€30–50 eachreserved seats
An hour and 35 minutes to Firenze Santa Maria Novella; Italo trains also run. The hotel is 10 minutes' walk from the station.
Florence's civic square with the Palazzo Vecchio and a copy of David at its door, and the medieval bridge of goldsmiths' shops over the Arno.
free
Ten minutes south of the Duomo. Dusk on the bridge, then dinner on the Oltrarno side: bistecca alla fiorentina, a T-bone sold by weight, is for two.
Brunelleschi's dome at a booked 8:30, lunch at the Mercato Centrale, the Uffizi at 14:00, and sunset from Piazzale Michelangelo.
🗺 The whole day in Google Maps →The cathedral's dome, finished in 1436, the largest brick dome ever built, raised without scaffolding from the ground by Filippo Brunelleschi; 463 steps go up between its inner and outer shells.
about €30 eachday's highlighttimed slot
The Brunelleschi Pass gives the dome at a set time, Giotto's bell tower, the baptistery and the museum. Halfway up you walk round the inside of the dome under Vasari's Last Judgment; the top looks over every roof in Florence.
Narrow, steep, no lift. An hour.
The baptistery's golden mosaic ceiling, and the museum that keeps Ghiberti's original Gates of Paradise and Michelangelo's late Pietà.
same pass
The museum is the quiet part of the pass and the best of it after the dome. An hour.
The Medici's offices, now a gallery of Renaissance painting: Botticelli's Birth of Venus and Primavera, Leonardo's Annunciation, Caravaggio's Medusa.
about €25–30 eachtimed slot
After lunch at the Mercato Centrale's food hall upstairs. In the gallery go straight to the Botticelli rooms on the second floor, then walk on in order. The café terrace looks onto the Palazzo Vecchio's tower. Two and a half hours.
A terrace on the hill south of the Arno with the whole city laid out below: the dome, the Palazzo Vecchio, the bridges.
free
Twenty-five minutes' walk up through the San Niccolò gate and the rose garden, or bus 12. Sunset about 20:20. San Miniato church, five minutes higher, is quieter. Dinner in San Niccolò on the way down.
Michelangelo's David at the Accademia at 8:15, the San Lorenzo market, then the Oltrarno: the Boboli Gardens, Santo Spirito and an aperitivo.
🗺 The whole day in Google Maps →The marble David, 5 metres tall, carved by Michelangelo at 26 from a block others had abandoned; the unfinished Prisoners lead up to it.
about €20 eachday's highlighttimed slot
Take the first slot; the hall is quiet for half an hour. Walk all the way round: the veins in the hands and the frown are the point. An hour is enough.
The Medici family's church and their tomb chapels, one designed by Michelangelo with his figures of Night and Day.
about €10 each
Ten minutes from the Accademia. The leather market fills the streets round San Lorenzo; haggle, or skip it.
The Medici's hillside garden behind the Pitti Palace: avenues of cypress, grottoes, statues and a porcelain museum at the top with a view of the hills.
about €10 each
After lunch in the Oltrarno. Climb to the Kaffeehaus terrace and the top garden for the view south over olive groves. Two hours.
The Oltrarno's square, with Brunelleschi's plain church front and bars spilling onto the steps.
€10–15 each
A spritz or a glass of Chianti with snacks, then dinner nearby; book on a Sunday.
The 9:25 train to Venice, two hours. The vaporetto down the Grand Canal, St Mark's Basilica and the Doge's Palace, then cicchetti along the canals.
🗺 The whole day in Google Maps →€30–55 eachreserved seats
Two hours and five minutes to Venezia Santa Lucia, the station on the Grand Canal. Get off at Santa Lucia, not Mestre.
Venice's main street, lined with palaces from the 13th to the 18th century; the slow water bus stops on both banks.
about €9.50 a ride, €25 for 24 hoursday's highlight
From the station, line 1 to Rialto, 25 minutes, under the Rialto bridge. A 24-hour pass pays for itself in three rides. Sit at the front if the seats are free; the view is to both sides.
Drop the bags at the hotel.
The Doge's church, built in the 11th century to hold the relics of Saint Mark, with domes and walls covered in 8,000 square metres of gold-ground mosaics.
about €5 each bookedshoulders coveredbook a time
After lunch near the Rialto. Book a time to skip the line. The terrace over the square, with the original bronze horses inside, is a separate ticket and worth it. Big bags are not allowed.
The seat of the Venetian Republic for a thousand years, with Tintoretto's Paradise, one of the largest paintings in the world, and the Bridge of Sighs to the prisons.
about €30 each
The route ends crossing the Bridge of Sighs from inside and through the prison cells. Two hours.
Cicchetti are Venice's bar snacks, small bites on bread eaten standing with a glass of wine, an ombra.
€20–35 each
Walk north into Cannaregio, along the Fondamenta della Misericordia: bacari, wine bars, with tables over the water. Dinner of cicchetti, or a sit-down risotto al nero, black with cuttlefish ink.
The Rialto bridge before the crowds and the fish market, the quiet lanes of San Polo, then the bus from Piazzale Roma for the 15:00 flight.
🗺 The whole day in Google Maps →The stone bridge of 1591 over the Grand Canal, and the market beside it where Venice has bought fish and vegetables for 700 years.
free
At this hour the bridge is nearly empty. The fish market under the Pescheria's arcades is open Tuesday to Saturday from 7:30. Coffee standing at a bar nearby.
A great brick gothic church with Titian's Assumption over the high altar and his tomb inside.
about €5
Through San Polo's lanes, ten minutes. Then lunch early nearby and back for the bags.
about €10 each
Walk or vaporetto to Piazzale Roma; the airport bus takes 25 minutes. At the airport by 13:00 for the 15:00 flight. The Alilaguna boat is slower, over an hour.
Trenitalia's Frecciarossa and Italo's trains run Rome–Florence–Venice every half hour or so, with reserved seats. Book on trenitalia.com or italotreno.com; early fares are much cheaper. Regional tickets on paper must be stamped before boarding; e-tickets need nothing.
In May, the five sights below sell out weeks ahead; book them first and plan the days around the times.
The Colosseum, the Vatican Museums, the Duomo climb, the Uffizi and the Accademia, on their official sites. Resellers charge double for the same ticket. Churches want shoulders and knees covered.
Venice charges day-trippers an access fee on busy days; staying the night exempts you. If the city's portal asks, register your hotel stay there.
Lunch 12:30–14:30, dinner from 19:30, later in Rome. A coperto, cover charge, of €2–4 each is normal; tipping is not expected beyond rounding up. Coffee standing at the bar costs a third of coffee at a table.
Cards work almost everywhere. Keep €50 in cash for bars, gelato and markets. Hotels add a city tax of €3–7 per person a night, paid on the spot.
For two, 7 days and 6 nights from Rome to Venice: rooms, trains, tickets, food and a buffer. Flights are not included.
| Item | Economy | Comfort | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hotel in Rome, 2 nights | €320 | €520 | |
| Hotel in Florence, 3 nights | €420 | €690 | |
| Hotel in Venice, 1 night | €180 | €320 | |
| City taxes | €60 | €80 | |
| Trains: airport, Rome–Florence, Florence–Venice | €170 | €240 | |
| Taxis, buses, vaporetto pass, airport bus | €130 | €180 | |
| Colosseum, Vatican, Pantheon, Duomo, Uffizi, Accademia, Medici Chapels, Boboli, St Mark's, Doge's Palace | €370 | €420 | About €185–210 each |
| Lunches | €220 | €320 | 7 lunches for two |
| Dinners | €400 | €560 | 6 dinners for two |
| Coffee, gelato, aperitivo | €90 | €130 | |
| Buffer | €120 | €250 | |
| Total | €2,480 | €3,710 |
Realistic figure: About €2,800–3,200 for two, without flights
Cards work almost everywhere. Keep €50 in cash for bars and markets.
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