Ride a gondola through Venice’s canals and see the city from the waterways that have served its residents for centuries. From the low seat of the boat, take in waterside facades, bridges and the close-up details of canal life.

The gondola remains one of Venice’s most recognisable craft, shaped for travel through its narrow waterways. It offers an intimate contrast to the included private-boat crossing. The ride is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

• 4 Dinner (D)
• 21 Breakfast (B)

• London: A modular trip means fellow travellers will join and leave at various locations. There’ll be some goodbyes, sure, but there’ll also be plenty of hellos with new like-minded travellers.
• Rome: If you require arrangements to be made for your accessibility needs, please inform your Trip Manager as soon as possible. We try our best to contact all accommodations and secure ground floor rooms for easy wheelchair access.Please remember that Italy can be physically challenging to get around. Coaches can’t access historical centers, and there will be lots of walking (on roads that are often uneven and cobbled). Travellers with accessibility needs will find this trip challenging.
• Madrid: Yep. Usually, we arrange a buffet for all your included meals. If you’d like a vegetarian option, please inform your Trip Manager beforehand, and they’ll sort it out for you.
• Rome: This would depend on the museums & attractions you’re planning to visit. If you’d like to know the exact timings, please contact our 24×7 Helpline to access your day-to-day itineraries to check when you’ll have free time in each city.
• Madrid: Of course! Just inform your Trip Manager if you need refrigeration on the coach. Please remember that the fridge is turned off overnight, so you’ll have to take your medication with you into your accommodation. We recommend that you bring a cooler bag with you as a backup. It’s your responsibility to store your medication with care. 

• Rome: Stroll around the Italian capital, ticking off some sights on your bucket list! 
• Rome:  Kick back with your Contiki crew and feast on some yummy Italian cuisine – served at a local restaurant working to train and provide jobs for members of the community with disabilities.
   
• Siena: This medieval Tuscan city is packed with charming photo ops. From the Duomo to Piazza del Campo. 
• Florence: See the Duomo, Basilica Santa Croce, Giotto’s Bell Tower, the Baptistery & Piazza della Signoria on a locally guided walking tour of Florence.
• Pisa: Your ultimate chance to ‘hold the tower up’ as you pose for that classic Insta snap. 
• Lucca: Ramble around the cobbled streets of this Renaissance walled city in Tuscany. It’s an Insta post waiting to happen! 
• Cinque Terre National Park: We’ll take care of your rail pass, so you can just zip around the iconic clifftop villages and focus on the Insta stories. Wanna hike around too? You’re welcome to explore on foot along the way.
• Verona: This is the address behind the legendary love story. Visit Juliet’s House and see the spot that turned Verona into a global icon.
• Venice: Speed across the lagoon to the aqueous island of Venice.
• Rome: Wander through the ruins of the ancient Roman Empire’s political heart, while our Local Guide peels back the layers of history & reconstructs the past. From the assassinations at the Forum to the bloody battles in the Colosseum, learn how the roots of Western culture started here. 
• Amalfi Coast: Definitely one for the bucket list. Your chance to view one of Europe’s active volcanoes from a distance. 
• Capri: Chill on the beaches of this Mediterranean jewel. Explore the famous boutiques then stop off for a Spritz in the sun. 
• Amalfi Coast: Live your best life like a local (on a ferry!) as you glide through azure seas, past cliffs filled with rainbow-coloured buildings. 
• Positano: Ramble through the wisteria-lined streets and past sun-bleached houses as you live La Dolce Vita. Don’t forget an iconic selfie with the village backdrop.
• Catania: Time to take to the sky. Catania, here we come!
• Catania: Stroll around the ancient Sicilian port at the foot of Mount Etna. See the Piazza Stesicoro and the Baroque and Renaissance buildings of Via dei Crociferi.
• Taormina: Greek and Roman ruins. Sun-drenched beaches. Epic Italian food. There’s so much to do in this seaside town, you’ll never want to leave. 
• Noto: Float around this opulent Sicilian city, taking in the Baroque architecture and panoramic views as you go.
• Agrigento: Explore the Valley of the Temples in Agrigento, a UNESCO-listed site featuring some of the world’s most treasured Greek art and architecture.

Contiki

Walk through Rome with your Contiki group and take in the streets, squares and ancient landmarks that make the Italian capital an open-air record of its past. This included orientation offers a chance to get your bearings while sharing first impressions with fellow travellers.

Look for the layers of ancient Rome and the modern city in the stonework, street life and neighbourhoods around you. The walk is a city introduction rather than a promise of entry to individual monuments.

Share an Italian dinner with your Contiki crew at a local Rome restaurant that trains and employs members of the community with disabilities. The meal brings the group together around familiar Italian flavours while supporting the people who prepare and serve them.

This is more than a routine restaurant stop: the venue’s community-focused mission gives the evening a distinctive local connection. Enjoy the conversation and hospitality while learning what makes the restaurant’s work meaningful.

Explore Siena’s UNESCO-listed historic centre, where narrow medieval streets lead towards the shell-shaped Piazza del Campo and the marble-clad Siena Cathedral. This included stop gives you time to appreciate the city’s architecture and find your own viewpoint among its brick lanes.

Siena’s compact centre still reflects the wealth and civic pride of a powerful medieval Tuscan city-state. Its squares and facades offer plenty to see without assuming entry to the cathedral or other ticketed buildings.

Sit down to an included feast of local delicacies in Florence and get acquainted with Tuscany through its food. Sharing the meal with your group makes this a convivial introduction to a city where markets, trattorias and regional ingredients are central to daily life.

Florentine cooking is known for letting good ingredients speak plainly, from Tuscan bread and olive oil to hearty seasonal dishes. The dinner’s distinctive appeal is the chance to taste local flavours together rather than simply find a place to eat.

Join a Local Guide on foot through Florence to see the Duomo, Giotto’s Bell Tower and the Baptistery, along with Basilica di Santa Croce and Piazza della Signoria. Hear how these landmarks fit into the city’s artistic and political life while walking its historic streets.

The cathedral complex reveals Florence’s ambition in marble and masonry; Piazza della Signoria evokes the era of the Florentine Republic and the Medici. This is a guided sightseeing walk, with no interior admission specified.

Wander Lucca’s cobbled streets and discover piazzas, historic cafés and Renaissance-era buildings inside one of Tuscany’s best-preserved walled cities. The included stop is an opportunity to explore the centre on foot and take in its relaxed pace.

Lucca’s broad defensive walls still encircle the old town, setting it apart from many Italian cities whose fortifications disappeared as they grew. Look for the contrast between monumental walls and intimate squares as you roam.

See the Leaning Tower of Pisa and find your angle for the classic photograph beside its unmistakably tilted columns. This included visit places you in Piazza dei Miracoli, the monumental square shared by the tower, cathedral and baptistery.

Built as the cathedral’s bell tower, the structure began leaning as its foundations settled into soft ground. Its pale marble and improbable slant make the square a memorable sight even without climbing the tower; tower admission is not specified.

Use your included Cinque Terre rail pass to move between the five villages along Liguria’s coast. Explore at your own pace, stopping for harbour views, narrow lanes and brightly coloured houses gathered above the sea. You can also choose to walk accessible trails between villages.

The national park’s terraced hillsides and settlements reveal how communities made a living on this steep coastline. Trail access and conditions can vary, so the train offers a practical way to enjoy the landscape without committing to a hike.

Pause beside Lake Como to take in the mountain-framed water and the elegant lakeside setting that has long drawn visitors to northern Italy. This included visit is about enjoying the view from shore and experiencing the atmosphere of the lake.

Steep slopes and waterfront buildings give Como a character quite different from the cities elsewhere on the trip. Take time for lakeside photographs and a look around; the separately offered boat ride is an optional experience.

Visit Juliet’s House in Verona, the address associated with Shakespeare’s star-crossed lovers. See the courtyard and the famous balcony that have made this corner of the city a destination for visitors drawn by the story of Romeo and Juliet.

Shakespeare set the play in Verona, but Juliet herself is fictional; the house’s appeal lies in how literature has shaped the city’s identity. This included visit does not specify admission to the house’s museum.

Cross the Venetian lagoon by private boat to reach the historic heart of Venice. Watch the city’s waterfront come into view from the water, an arrival that reveals why boats, canals and landing stages remain essential to everyday life here.

Venice grew as a maritime republic across a network of lagoon islands. Approaching by boat makes its waterbound geography immediately tangible, from the changing light on the lagoon to the first sight of its dense historic buildings.

Explore Bologna’s UNESCO-listed porticoes during an included stop in this food-loving Emilia-Romagna city. Walk beneath the covered arcades that line its streets, noticing how they connect shops, cafés and public spaces while offering shelter from sun and rain.

Bologna is nicknamed La Grassa for its rich culinary tradition, including mortadella and ragù. Its porticoes tell another local story: generations of urban life built around these distinctive shared walkways.

Walk through the remains of ancient Rome with a Local Guide and hear the stories behind its political centre. The included experience brings the Roman Forum and Colosseum into context, from public life and power struggles to the spectacles staged for enormous crowds.

Rather than viewing the ruins as isolated stones, learn how these places shaped Roman society and left a lasting mark on Western culture. The provided itinerary does not confirm interior admission to the Colosseum as part of this included walk.

Spend time on Capri, an island of dramatic limestone cliffs, Mediterranean views and café-lined streets. Browse its boutiques, seek out a coastal viewpoint or settle in with a drink while taking in the island’s lively holiday atmosphere.

Capri’s setting has attracted visitors since Roman times, and its glamorous reputation sits alongside a striking natural landscape. This included island visit gives you a feel for both; the cove cruise is a separate optional experience.

Travel along the Amalfi Coast by ferry and see its villages from the water. Look up at steep cliffs, clustered pastel buildings and roads tracing the slopes above the Tyrrhenian Sea as you glide between coastal points.

The seaward view shows how little level ground these communities have and why boats remain such a natural way to travel here. On clear stretches, the wider Bay of Naples landscape may also offer distant views towards Mount Vesuvius.

Walk through Positano, where narrow lanes and stairways wind between sun-washed buildings on the Amalfi Coast. Take in the village’s shops, flowering walls and changing sea views, and find a vantage point for its familiar cliffside silhouette.

Positano’s striking appearance comes from its steep terrain: houses appear stacked above the shoreline, with routes through town often made on foot. This included visit gives you space to experience the village at street level, not only as a coastal photograph.

Explore Catania’s historic centre at the foot of Mount Etna. Walk through its UNESCO-listed core to see Piazza Stesicoro and Via dei Crociferi, where churches and grand facades speak to the city’s Baroque heritage.

Catania was extensively rebuilt after the devastating 1693 earthquake, often using dark volcanic stone from nearby Etna. The contrast between that stone and ornate architecture gives the Sicilian port a distinctive streetscape to discover on foot.

Ride the cable car in Taormina and take in views between the hillside town and the coast below. The journey offers a memorable perspective on the steep setting that gives this Sicilian resort its mix of elevated streets and seaside access.

Taormina has welcomed visitors for centuries, drawn by its Mediterranean outlook and dramatic position above the water. The cable car makes that geography easy to appreciate, with sea and mountainside in the same view.

Walk through Noto and admire the palaces, churches and broad streets of one of Sicily’s celebrated Baroque towns. Look along Corso Vittorio Emanuele for honey-coloured stone facades and the carefully composed views that make the centre especially rewarding on foot.

Like Catania, Noto was rebuilt after the 1693 earthquake. Its planned streets and richly detailed buildings form part of the UNESCO-listed Late Baroque Towns of the Val di Noto, giving the visit a clear architectural story.

Visit an organic farm for a Tastes of Sicily experience centred on produce from the local landscape. Enjoy farm-fresh flavours in a setting that connects what is on your plate with the people and place behind it.

Sicilian food reflects the island’s fertile land, warm climate and long history of cultural exchange. An encounter at the farm offers a grounded way to appreciate those influences through ingredients grown close to their source, rather than through a standard restaurant meal.

Explore the Valley of the Temples near Agrigento, a UNESCO-listed archaeological site with ancient Greek temples, sanctuaries and burial grounds. Walk among the remains and take in the scale of the monuments against Sicily’s open landscape.

These structures recall Akragas, one of the most important Greek cities in the western Mediterranean. The exceptionally preserved Temple of Concordia helps convey the skill and ambition behind a site whose history stretches back roughly 2,500 years.

Stroll Cefalù’s cobbled old-town streets and experience the rhythm of this north-coast Sicilian fishing town. Look towards its harbour, watch for fishermen bringing in or sorting their catch, and take in the meeting of historic buildings and the sea.

Cefalù’s character is shaped by both its coastal livelihood and its layered heritage; its Norman cathedral is one of Sicily’s notable medieval landmarks. The included walk is a chance to enjoy everyday life in the old town at a relaxed pace.

Join a walking tour through Palermo’s historic centre to hear the story of the city’s resistance to organised crime. Learn about the people and civic movements that challenged Mafia influence while exploring streets at the heart of Sicily’s capital.

This experience looks beyond familiar headlines to the rise of Palermo’s anti-Mafia movement and its continuing importance to local life. It offers a thoughtful introduction to the city’s complex modern history, alongside its energetic public spaces.

Share an al fresco farewell dinner in Palermo at the venue described on the tour as the ‘bistro of second chances’. Gather with your fellow travellers over a meal that marks the close of your journey through mainland Italy and Sicily.

The bistro’s stated emphasis on second chances gives this dinner a particular social purpose. Its open-air setting and shared table make room for conversation and reflection in a city known for its lively food culture.

Experience a Tuscan evening in Florence featuring a risotto demonstration, local wine, antipasto and something sweet to finish. Watch the preparation, taste the dishes and enjoy a more food-focused way to spend an evening in the city.

The combination of cooking and dining offers a closer look at the ingredients and convivial traditions behind Italian meals. This experience is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Discover wines at a vineyard outside Lucca and exchange the city’s walled streets for a taste of the surrounding Tuscan countryside. This option centres on local wine and the landscape in which it is produced.

Wine growing has long been part of rural life around Lucca, where vineyards sit among farms and wooded hills. Specific wines and tasting arrangements are not detailed in the itinerary. The experience is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Get out on Lake Como by boat for a water-level view of its mountain slopes and elegant shoreline. See the lakeside scenery from a different angle than the included shore visit, with the water itself becoming the focus of the experience.

Como’s long, branching shape creates changing perspectives as boats move across it, revealing waterfront buildings set against steep green hills. This boat ride is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Cruise across the Venetian lagoon to Burano, an island known for its vividly painted houses and canals. Step away from central Venice’s busiest streets to experience a different side of the lagoon and its island communities.

Burano also has a longstanding lace-making tradition, part of the craft heritage behind its colourful appearance. The lagoon journey and island setting make this a distinct choice from a gondola ride. It is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Dine in a converted underground wine cellar in Rome and enjoy a meal with Italian wine in an atmospheric setting. Stone-lined surroundings offer a different feel from a typical street-level restaurant.

Rome’s older buildings often reveal another layer beneath the busy streets, making the cellar setting part of the evening’s appeal. The specific menu and wines are not stated. This dinner is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Tour the Colosseum with a guide to learn how Rome’s great amphitheatre hosted gladiatorial contests and other public spectacles. Hear the building’s history explained where emperors and enormous crowds once gathered.

The Colosseum’s surviving arches and seating structure still convey the scale of imperial Rome. This is presented in the itinerary as a choice alongside seeing it from outside; entry arrangements should be confirmed on tour. The guided tour is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Walk through Pompeii with a guide and discover streets and buildings preserved after Mount Vesuvius erupted in AD 79. The archaeological remains offer a remarkably direct look at the layout of an ancient Roman town.

Hear how volcanic material buried Pompeii and helped preserve evidence of its homes, businesses and public spaces. A guide adds human context to the ruins rather than leaving them as a backdrop. This tour is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Take a tour of Naples focused on the city’s history and food culture. Explore its streets with local context, learning how generations of residents have shaped both the urban landscape and the dishes for which Naples is known.

Naples has deep Greek and Roman roots and a fiercely distinctive culinary identity, particularly its pizza tradition. This tour offers a way to understand the city beyond a brief visit. It is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Cruise around Capri’s coast and look up at its dramatic cliffs from the water. The experience includes opportunities to stop for a swim in turquoise coves, adding a more active coastal outing to the included island visit.

Boat travel reveals the rocky shoreline that helped make Capri famous long before its boutiques and cafés did. Swim opportunities depend on conditions and the operator’s arrangements. This cruise is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Visit a family-run lemon farm on the Amalfi Coast and learn about a crop closely identified with the region. Meet a local family whose ancestors introduced lemon growing here, and see the agricultural side of a coastline often viewed only for its villages and sea.

Lemon groves have long occupied terraces carved into the steep slopes, helping shape both the landscape and local food traditions. This visit is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Make your own pasta with a local chef in Rome and sit down to eat what you have prepared. This hands-on experience turns a familiar Italian dish into a chance to learn by doing.

Pasta traditions vary across Italy, with shapes and sauces reflecting regional habits and ingredients. Working alongside a chef offers practical insight that a restaurant meal alone cannot provide. The class is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Cook with local professionals in Taormina and try your hand at Sicilian specialities such as arancini and cannoli. The class gives you a practical way to engage with the island’s food traditions rather than only tasting the finished dishes.

Sicilian cuisine draws on a long history of Mediterranean influences, visible in its ingredients, techniques and sweets. Learn something of that heritage at the worktop. This class is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Ride up towards Mount Etna on an optional excursion from the Taormina area, passing vineyards and orchards on the slopes of Europe’s highest active volcano. The changing landscape offers a striking contrast with Sicily’s seaside towns.

Etna’s eruptions have repeatedly reshaped the surrounding terrain, while its volcanic soils support local agriculture. Conditions and access can change on an active mountain, so the exact route may vary. This excursion is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Cruise along the coast by Cefalù for a view of this Sicilian town from the sea. Take in its shoreline and the backdrop of La Rocca, the great rock rising behind the historic centre.

Seeing Cefalù from the water puts its fishing-town setting into perspective and offers a restful alternative to time on the beach. The exact cruise route is not specified in the itinerary. This experience is optional, at additional cost and bookable on tour.