If you use Florence (Firenze) as your base you could a spend a day there, then 1 day to see Pisa (the leaning Tower) and Lucca (about 40 miles from Florence) and maybe 1 day to see the beautiful tuscan hill town of San Gimignano and the city Sienna (which is also about 40 miles from Florence also).

Rome would be my 1st choice, but since you’re “not interested,” I agree with Finn about Florence.

Salerno!!! we had an amzing time there. awesome beaches, minimal amount of tourists, short bus ride up amalfi coast and cheap! look into it. itsour fave city in Italy.

Rome would also be my first choice, but I love Siena, Arezzo, and other hill towns, and yes, from Florence, it’s easy to reach these places, esp Siena.
Cortona is a bit farther but I liked it a lot.

Cinque Terra for 3 days will give you a chance to hike a 10 mile trail through “fantasyland” terrain. The train will drop you off in the middle of the chain of 5 small villages and you will eat great seafood, relax in the Med Sea sunshine, and see La Dolce Vita.

Florence was a favourite me, and as mentioned you can make short trips from there.
Whatever you do, get the hell out of Ancona ASAP!!!

Is ancona really a dump? i think we have 3 hours or so before our train leaves from ancona to florence. is there nothing to do? dangerous? some info would be great, because i will look into sailing into other ports like pescara bari or brindisi if ancona is that bad of a mess!

No, no no. Ancona is perfectly fine. Just go walk around the city centre, lots of pleasant streets and old buildings to soak in, and grab a bite to eat (if anything is open during siesta time). Maybe check out a church or two.

Bari is a dump…totally crime infested

Naples and Bari are crime-infested, Milan and Genoa are dirty…bla bla bla…Italy is an armpit shithole…bla bla bla…yes, we know how you feel about Italy, finnegan.

Finnegan, I find it surprising that you bother to travel…given that you’ve disliked 99% of the places you’ve been to. Is this your way of bragging about your travels, by trashing every place you’ve visited? Bari may have had some petty theft in the city centre before its gentrification…but I feel far safer in Bari than any city in North America. Naples is one thing, but now that you’ve trashed Bari (for crying out loud) there’s no longer any doubt in my mind that you harbour a deep prejudice against Southern European coutries. Not all cities in Italy are like Naples. And I have yet to see you describe Amsterdam, Stockholm, and London as “crime infested” given the very high levels of pickpocketing in the first two, alcoholism and drug addictions in the second, and senseless youth violence in the third. Or what about Antwerp’s seedy red-light district, which is nothing like Amsterdam’s touristy area (which is also quite seedy, according to a lot of people that have been there). And my buddy’s car was broken into when we visited your hometown Toronto. Let’s not start on American cities. When crime happens in those cities, you overlook it as a “fact of life” or “it only happens in certain areas” or “it’s only because you didn’t take certain precautions”. But when something goes wrong in Bari, oh well Bari is “crime infested”. Similar to how you [FALSELY] concluded that Portugal was a “developing country” because of its charming countryside. You went on to say that “away from the main tourist areas, electricity is basic”…what the hell “basic electricity” means, I have no idea (you either have electricity, or you don’t), but I do know that: while you have visited far more countries than I have, you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about half the time. At least I can claim I have knowledge and experience in one small part of the world…versus visiting every country on the planet for about a day each, and then regarding myself as an expert on international economic development. Yes, someone might steal something from you in Italy, particularly areas where tourists congregate…this is no worse than most other places of the world (especially in a country that gets slammed with 40+ million tourists every year ). Welcome to the real world finnegan. Shit happens. And it happens everywhere. Italy is actually one of the world’s SAFEST countries, but you have this hell-bent determination to make Eurotrip newbies develop this irrational fear of traveling to Italy. You once made a comment about Rio de Janeiro (because of my Rio 2016 sig)…and that’s true, Rio does have significantly higher levels of theft (as well as violent crime) than most other cities around the world. But Bari? You really took it too far this time.

Who pissed in your coffee this morning Luv? I think if you took the time to read my posts, you’ll actually find that I love Italy. It is probably the European country that I ‘ve visited most. It seems that most people posting here know which are the great places (Paris, Rome, etc.) but have trouble with the secondary cities (Milan, Naples, marseille, etc.). I thought this was a place where seasoned travellers could share their experiences and share advice. What’s with you and Portugal? I’m guessing you live there and are blinded by your nationalism that you can’t look at your own country objectively. I love Portugal and am hoping to go there again soon. I was in the Azores not long agao (which is part of portugal) and it is most definutely on the rustic side as are lots of other parts of the country. You see that as a negative, for me that is what makes portugal interesting.

And yes…Bari is a Sh#thole…go there to catch a ferry and get the hell out. Would you spend a week vacatioing in Bari Luv?

The survey data reveals that almost half of the citizens have been victimized for different crimes (including robberies, burglaries and other property crimes).
The report shows that the “dark number” – the amount crimes that are not officially recorded – is relatively high because it accounts for 42%; nevertheless, the majority of people still chooses to file reports to police.
Overall, 46% of people interviewed feel a significant fear of crime that influences the quality of life in the City of Bari.

http://www.unicri.it…

I rest my case.

I think Roma is the most interesting place in Italy, but if you stick to Florence region you definitely have to go to Sienna as well. Pisa as a city sucks, only the tower is fun to watch if you must, but you have seen it in 30 minutes.

Finnegan, I’ve already read too many of your posts, and you never have anything good to say about Italy. It’s always, “X is dirty” “Y is crime infested” and “Z is a shithole”. You never say anything else.

A simple “watch out for petty thieves in Bari that prey on unsuspecting backpackers” would have sufficed. But calling the city “crime infested” is ridiculous and false.

This website is intended for seasoned travelers to give sensible advice, not to pass down misinformation, which is what you’re doing.

Just because you don’t like it, doesn’t make it a shithole. Quit trying to make Italian cities sound like 3rd world backwaters. Your descriptions are completely absurd.

Illogical argument.

Just because it’s not the most ideal place to spend week-long vacation, doesn’t make it a shithole.

Bari is far less of a shithole that your hometown Toronto.

Oh come on finnegan, is that the best you can do?

I love how you do these frantic Google searches to find some statistic that you think proves your point, but you don’t provide statistics on other European cities for comparison. 46% of Bari residents feel that crime influences the quality of life in their city, according to an opinion poll. Okay, so? Does this really differ from other major European cities?

You’re not the only one who can do Google searches, finnegan. According to this Gallup poll , Britain, Ireland, and Estonia have the highest victimization rates in the European Union, followed by Sweden, Poland, Denmark, Belgium, and the Netherlands. This was a study conducted by Gallup, and not official law enforcement statistics, so you can’t use the argument that crimes are better reported in Northern Europe.

Of course, the way you skew things will always reflect your deeply prejudiced paradigm. Non-Anglo and non-Germanic societies are always backwards, and horrible and should be feared by innocent well-intentioned Anglosaxon/Germanic tourists who come from crime-free utopias.

No, as I already pointed out to you in the Portugal thread, you are the one who cannot look at Portugal objectively. You use subjective criteria to economically categorize the country, and look at the world through an anglocentric prism. The evidence is in your nonsensical claims: electricity in Portugal is “basic”, therefore Portugal is a developing country. What the fuck “basic electricity” means, you have thus far failed to clarify. And that’s because you just pull shit out of your ass, because you think you’ve become this expert on world economic development by visiting a foreign country for a couple days and observing a couple things that were new to you or that you didn’t understand.

I rest my case.

Luv you have to much time on your hands…you know what they say about people who argue on the internet…Italy is a great place, but like all countries it has a few places that aren’t worth the time for someone on a whirlwind tour: Milan, Naples and Bari are (I think) the only 3 that I have said to avoid. Otherwise, Italy is my fav destination.

Characterizing me as someone who hates Italy is laughable. And Bari is a shithole…Has anyone other than you ever recommended it? No one would ever go out of their way to go to Bari unless they had to catch a ferry to Greece.

Back on about Portugal? I’ve visited portugal on a least four occasions in the past 10 years…Lisbon is beautiful as is the rest of the country. I tend to shy away from the touristy areas and go to rural areas…compared to to middle class North American standards it can be rustic Basic electricity means brown outs and black outs i.e. unreliable service in some areas. Since this is a website based on people’s personal experience that has been mine with portugal. If you don’t like it I’m sorry…We’ll have to agree to disagree and let people make up their own minds. And you’re right about parts of Toronto being a shithole, as are most suburbs of Paris, New York, etc. If you’re mother lets you, you should come to Toronto and I’ll show you around

Cinque Terre….hands down the best place to go…spend a lot of time there too!