• 5 Dinner (D)
• 10 Breakfast (B)

• Rome: Gain fast-track admission to the Vatican Museums to marvel at the magnificent work of Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel.
• Rome: Discover ancient treasures of Rome with a Local Specialist. See Circus Maximus and visit the mighty Colosseum, which bears witness to the limitless courage of the gladiators.
• Rome: In the Vatican City visit St. Peter’s Basilica. Witness the early genius of Michelangelo as you take in the Pietà.
• Rome: During an orientation with your Travel Director see the medieval buildings, Renaissance palaces and Baroque churches scattered throughout the city.
• Pompeii: Walk with a Local Specialist through the cobbled streets of this ill-fated town, frozen in time since the 1st century.
• Capri: Join a Local Specialist for a guided walk through Capri’s elegant lanes and vibrant squares. Hear how this island has long attracted artists, writers and Hollywood icons. Visit historic landmarks and local boutiques, and discover how generations of islanders have lived alongside the glamour, from Roman emperors to the jet-set names of the 1950s and beyond.
• Assisi: With a Local Specialist, find out why the Basilica of St. Francis is considered to be one of the crowning artistic achievements of 13th-century Europe.
• Modena: Travel through the lush landscape of Emilia-Romagna, past hilltop towns and agricultural lands.
• Venice: Discover the ancient skill of Venetian glassblowing and play a part in preserving this traditional craft.
• Pisa: In the Piazza dei Miracoli, see the baptistery, cathedral and the famous Leaning Tower of Pisa.
• Florence: Join a Local Specialist to view the multicolored marble cathedral, bell tower and baptistery, adorned by Ghiberti’s Gates of Paradise. Visit the political heart of the city, Signoria Square.
• Florence: See the area around Santa Croce Basilica, famous for the quality of its luxury goods, and witness a gold and leatherwork demonstration.
• San Gimignano: Visit the medieval Manhattan of Italy as you explore the UNESCO-listed center of San Gimignano and admire the city’s distinctive towers. 

• Deluxe coach travel
• Selected hotel dinners plus a locally hosted meal
• 4-star stays

Trafalgar

Cruise Venice’s Grand Canal by boat and ride a gondola through narrower waterways on this evening Optional Experience. From the water, see the city’s buildings and bridges in the setting they were designed to face.

The Grand Canal has long served as Venice’s main thoroughfare, lined with palaces that recall its trading wealth. The quieter canals offer a more intimate view of the city’s waterborne character. This experience is at additional cost and bookable on tour.

Meet your Travel Director and fellow travellers over a light meal in Rome. This hosted gathering offers a chance to get acquainted and hear about the places and experiences that shape the journey through Italy.

Against the backdrop of the Eternal City, conversation turns to ancient history, regional traditions and the pleasures of travelling together. It is a relaxed introduction rather than a formal sightseeing visit.

Explore Rome with your Travel Director on an orientation that brings the city’s layers of history into focus. See how medieval buildings, Renaissance palaces and Baroque churches share the streets of the Italian capital.

Rome’s architectural mix reflects centuries of reinvention, from its ancient foundations to the grand building projects of popes and noble families. This introduction helps make sense of the contrasting styles you will encounter across the Eternal City.

Enter the Vatican Museums with fast-track admission alongside a Local Specialist and see Michelangelo’s frescoed Sistine Chapel ceiling. Visit St. Peter’s Basilica to view his marble Pietà, an early work of striking tenderness.

The museums hold art collected across centuries of papal patronage, while the basilica stands at the centre of the Roman Catholic Church. Access to the museums or basilica may be restricted on some departures; when museum tickets are unavailable, the visit is replaced by the Capitoline Museums.

Discover Ancient Rome with a Local Specialist, viewing the site of the Circus Maximus and entering the Colosseum. Explore the amphitheatre where gladiatorial contests and public spectacles once drew enormous crowds.

Completed in the first century CE, the Colosseum remains a powerful reminder of Roman engineering and the empire’s appetite for entertainment. The nearby Circus Maximus, once used for chariot racing, reveals the vast scale of public life in the ancient city.

Walk Pompeii’s excavated streets with a Local Specialist and examine the remains of a Roman city buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE. Its streets and surviving buildings offer an unusually direct glimpse of everyday urban life.

Hear how volcanic ash preserved details that might otherwise have vanished, while the guide brings the city’s history and its sudden destruction into perspective. Pompeii’s scale makes this more than a single monument: it is a walk through an ancient community.

Cruise to the Isle of Capri and join a Local Specialist for a walk through its elegant lanes and lively squares. Take in marina views, see the area around the Gardens of Augustus and discover the Piazzetta, the island’s celebrated gathering place.

Capri’s appeal stretches from Roman emperors to artists, writers and the jet set of the 1950s. The guided walk connects that glamorous reputation with the streets and viewpoints that islanders know today. The return cruise is included.

Visit Laboratorio Giuditta Brozzetti in Perugia and watch a private demonstration of traditional Italian hand-weaving. Meet representatives of the Alliance for Artisan Enterprise and see how wooden-frame looms are used to sustain a rare local craft.

This MAKE TRAVEL MATTER® experience connects Perugia’s textile heritage with the people preserving it. Your visit supports an artisan initiative aligned with the United Nations goal of sustainable cities and communities, giving the workshop’s historic techniques a continuing place in local life.

Explore the Basilica of St. Francis with a Local Specialist in the hilltop town of Assisi. Look for its stained glass and celebrated fresco cycles, including works associated with Giotto, as you learn about the life and legacy of St. Francis.

Begun in the 13th century, the basilica became both a place of pilgrimage and a landmark in the development of Italian painting. Its art gives visual form to the Franciscan story in the saint’s hometown.

Travel by private launch to a Venetian glassblowing workshop and watch artisans shape molten glass using techniques rooted in the city’s centuries-old craft tradition. Continue to St. Mark’s Square to view the basilica, the ornate Doge’s Palace and the Bridge of Sighs from outside.

Venice’s glassmakers became renowned across Europe, while the square was the ceremonial heart of its maritime republic. The waterborne approach and craft demonstration reveal two distinctive sides of a city built around its canals.

Visit Pisa’s Field of Miracles to view the Leaning Tower alongside the cathedral and baptistery. See how the tower’s unmistakable tilt transforms a medieval bell tower into one of Italy’s most recognisable landmarks.

Set within the Piazza dei Miracoli, these buildings express the wealth and ambition of medieval Pisa. Their pale stone and shared setting make the ensemble striking even without entering the monuments; the itinerary specifies an exterior viewing rather than tower admission.

Explore Florence with a Local Specialist, viewing the marble-clad Duomo and Baptistery, visiting Piazza della Signoria and seeing the Ponte Vecchio. See the area around Santa Croce Basilica and watch a demonstration of Florentine gold and leatherwork.

The route traces the public spaces of a city shaped by the Medici and Renaissance artists. From the Baptistery’s celebrated doors to the workshops behind Florence’s luxury goods, it pairs monumental art with living craft traditions.

Join a Be My Guest dinner with the Callistri family at their Tuscan borgo. Share an Italian meal, taste olive oil and take a leisurely walk among the olive groves and lemon orchards.

Hosted on a family property in the Tuscan hills, the experience puts local produce and personal hospitality at the centre of the evening. The tasting offers a closer look at an ingredient fundamental to the region’s cooking, in the landscape where it is grown.

Walk through San Gimignano’s UNESCO-listed centre to the triangular Piazza della Cisterna and admire the towers rising above its medieval streets. The hilltop town’s distinctive skyline has earned it the nickname the ‘medieval Manhattan’.

Built as symbols of status by powerful families, the surviving towers make the town’s medieval rivalries visible today. Explore the stone-lined centre and its local shops at your own pace, with time to appreciate the architecture that sets San Gimignano apart.

Gather for a celebration dinner in Rome with your fellow travellers. This hosted evening is an opportunity to share impressions of Italy over a meal, from its ancient cities to its island and Tuscan landscapes.

Rather than a sightseeing visit, the experience is centred on the company built throughout the tour. Conversation and Italian hospitality provide a fitting close to the shared journey in the city where it began.

Explore Capri’s coastline by private motor launch, cruising past rugged cliffs and looking towards the island’s hidden grottos. Seeing Capri from the water offers a different perspective from its lanes and hilltop viewpoints.

The island’s steep limestone shores and sea-carved openings are part of the scenery that has drawn visitors for generations. This is an Optional Experience at additional cost, bookable on tour; the itinerary does not specify entry to any particular grotto.