Seeking Advice

[ladysprite]

So I promised myself someday I would go to Italy. Except that, when I put things in abstract terms like that, I never actually get around to doing them - I come up with excuses to postpone, and not to waste money on frivolities, and reasons it's not practical, until it's too late. So I promised myself last year that in 2012 I would go to Italy, because when I set concrete dates like that, it's harder to back out.

And now, with umbran anticipating gainful employment, it looks like this is actually going to be feasible. Which is both awesome and scary.

Here's the deal - I've never traveled outside the country before, with the exception of one (awesome) week in England when I was 22. I've never been somewhere that I don't speak the language, I've never had to navigate foreign cities, and I have precious little idea of what to expect.

So I'm taking this opportunity to pick the brains of my friends - any advice for traveling the world, and Italy in particular? We're looking at going sometime in October, both for our anniversary and because I've been told that's a decent time of year to head there, and I'd like to go to Venice, if only because that's where a huge chunk of my SCA efforts have been focused. Rome would be awesome too, if it's feasible to hit both. A coworker has recommended this tour company, which *seems* pretty cool, but I'm not sure whether that would fall into the category of 'making things incredibly easier' versus 'spending a lot of money to make the experience pre-processed and cheesy.'

Any hints, advice, or experiences in general would be welcome!

Comments

[ayalanya.livejournal.com]

More advice later, but after going to Naples -

- Eat everything on your plate. Eat slowly if you have to, take hours if you have to, but restaurant folks get upset if you don't eat all the food you order.

- Try not to drive yourself if you can help it. Drivers over there are terrifying. As a pedestrian, though, it's safe to assume that cars will usually stop for you even if it looks like they won't. Try to cross with crowds anyway.

- There are pickpockets. Keep stuff in harder-to-reach areas. I was fine in my cargo pants.

[iamjw.livejournal.com]

Try to find hotels within reasonable walking distance of the things you really want to see. Public transportation can be difficult to navigate when you don't speak the language, so budget for cabs. In Venice, that would be gondolas. One afternoon of city tour bus will give you a good overview of the big tourist spots and then you can mark down those things you want to go back and explore on your own. You can also got the hostel route if you really want to save money and don't care about sleeping in a room with strangers.

It used to be, in Europe in general, that when you got to a city you could locate the tourist information office and they would find you a hotel. You would give them your cost parameters and needs (bathroom in the room, location) and they would find you a place. I don't know if they still do that, though, but if they do it's useful to keep in mind in case you have a sudden urge to visit somewhere you hadn't planned.

Invest in a money belt, for passport and extra cash. A purse that has a strap that goes across your body rather than over one shoulder is more likely to deter pickpockets. Don't wear good jewelry, or flash an expensive camera.

Instead of eating in restaurants all the time, pocket some of the rolls from the continental breakfast (likely included in your hotel costs), or locate a good bakery and buy bread, cheese, meat etc. Then make your own lunches or dinners and cut down on food costs. Although, you really do have to eat out at least some of the time - the food in Italy is brilliant. But beware of portions - there are often several courses, and there's a lot of food.

Drink bottled water. Or wine. *g*

See if you can d/l maps of walking tours.

Italy has good train service. It's probably easiest to move from city to city by train than any other way.

GO TO FLORENCE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[solipsistnation.livejournal.com]

My parents like untours: http://www.untours.com/

They work with locals mostly-- you stay in somebody's apartment for a week or two and while there are tours (also led by locals) you can ignore those if you want. They do these once a year or so and have a great time whereever they go.

Either way, Rick Steeves is apparently the guy whose books you should read if you want travel advice.

[etherial.livejournal.com]

I've been to Southern Italy: Napoli, Capri, Amalfi Coast, Sicily. March 2003.

1. My first piece of advice would have been to go in late March/early April. Tourist season is about to start, so they're opening up the pools but aren't charging full rates. My college group went for $2000 and stayed in 4-star hotels for a week. Meals and airfare included.

2. Don't worry about cash. If your debit card has a 4-digit pin and your bank isn't a jerk about international transactions, your credit card is the way to go, and your debit card can get you all the cash you need.

3. Eat in restaurants, but don't forget sandwich vendors and street carts. Amazing food and cheap, too.

4. Gelato. OMG, Gelato.

[rosinavs.livejournal.com]

I've never done one of the big tour companies, so I can't say anything on quality vs. price. I have been to Italy once (Rome, Florence, and Pisa), Europe twice, and Central America once. Several of the countries I have been to, neither I nor anyone else I was with spoke more than guidebook phrases of the language, and it's really not that hard to get around. As long as you are in a big city, people are used to tourists not speaking their language. If you have a guidebook and map with public trans info on it, you can even use public trans to get everywhere.

It is entirely feasible to do both Rome and Venice, depending on how long you plan to be there, how much you want to see in each place, and how many things you cram into a day. A week would be enough to do both, with seeing two or three sites of interest a day, if you want to see about 5-7 sites of interest in each city. Guidebooks will often tell you how much time to allot to each site, but often allot too little time to museums for the typical SCAdian. A tour also might not allot enough time in museums for you. A quick glance at one tour on your link shows that they don't mention going to the Uffizi Galleries while in Florence, which is one of the necessary stops in that city, IMO. I would recommend researching the place you want to go and seeing if all the things you want to see are on the tour. If items you want to see are not on the tour, you could stay a day after/before the tour and see them on your own. Some tours allow for time on your own to explore, including the one listed above, so that might work too.

I can't recommend seeing Florence too much. It has a much more medieval feel than Rome, and has lots of interesting things to see: the Ponte Vecchio, the baptistry doors, the Uffizi, Michelangelo's David. Of the places I went to in Italy, it is the city I most want to return to.

If you decide to see Rome on your own, be careful to research what days the Forum is open before you go. It was not open when I was there :(

Make sure that you keep your passport and other important items in internal pockets or under clothing. Each trip I have been on, either I or someone I was with had a near miss or something stolen. In Rome, a group of small children were running around with sheets of newspaper. They would run up to a tourist with a fanny pack, get close enough to put the newspaper over the fanny pack, and open the fanny pack under the newspaper where the tourist couldn't see. They were trying this even after one of my group pointed this out to us. On other trips, I have put my hand down near my pocket and felt another hand trying to get into it, and one of my students had an exterior pocket of her backpack unzipped and her passport and wallet stolen.

Since you are going in October, you probably won't be wearing shorts, which are often frowned on in the cathedrals and churches. I don't think the ones in Italy require skirts.

Eat gelato.

[mermaidlady]

Check in with learnedax -- he was in Venice not too long ago.

When I was in Italy (a long time ago), most people spoke at least a tiny bit of English and were pretty patient with a tourist communicating via phrasebook and wild gesticulations. (except for the guys who tried to arrest me, but that's a tale for another time).

[NB: I haven't use a tour company since I was a teenager] Tours are nice because they take care of the logistics. And it's great for visiting multiple cities or ones with lousy public transit because you don't need to worry about getting yourself from place to place. That said, make sure they let you have plenty of free time for exploration. Your priorities are likely to be different from your average American tourist.

That said, I think you could handle it on your own. Travel arrangements in foreign countries have gotten vastly easier with the Internet.

[leanne-opaskar.livejournal.com]

Having never been, I don't have any immediate advice about going. But -- if you do want to spend a little time learning the language, you can get free learn-Italian podcasts at http://www.italianpod101.com

I've used it before and like it (ItalianPod specifically) -- I actually currently pay for a subscription to JapanesePod101.com which is by the same company.

(Be aware that it does pop up a little video with sound immediately on accessing the website. Mef.)

[jdulac.livejournal.com]

I found Italy fairly easy going (in spite of my surname, I don't really speak the language). I managed to stay in small family pensiones, which aren't too expensive. Venice is a wonderful city to walk in. You don't even have to go anywhere special, just wandering around is fabulous. There are high speed boats (vaporetto) that are the equivalent of buses up and down the Grand Canal that are easy to use (Gondolas are for tourists and expensive, you might treat yourself to one in the evening but its like getting a horse drawn carriage to go to the grocery store). You will always find good food. You don't need to eat in fancy restaurants -- there are little places in every piazza, and a plate of vongole by a canal is perfectly satisfying. San Marco is a zoo, but that's ok. Has probably been for centuries.

I recommend taking the train between cities. You can figure out the trains easily enough and they work well. Do not drive -- it is not for the faint of heart. Luckily, you don't need to. Florence, for example, is a small city and you can walk wherever you want to get to. There is more art per square inch there than anyplace on earth, be prepared for brain overload. Rome is much bigger, but you can get around.

I wouldn't stress about it. These places are used to tourists. Dress modestly in churches (no shorts or tank tops). You can be topless on the Lido, but it's all a question of context. Keep your valuables close, don't carry around a ton of luggage, it is a nuisance on the train. You can use a credit card or ATM card anywhere. People don't use Travelers Cheques any more, expect people to be puzzled by them if you try. There are also Changes (Cambio), but the ATM is easier (4 digit passwords last time I checked).

I assume you'll be with your husband, which means you won't have to put up with the heckling men direct at anything resembling an attractive woman.

Read up in advance, Rick Steves is probably a great guidebook, but also check out Lonely Planet, Fodors, and similar, just to get some perspectives.

[clstal.livejournal.com]

Who boy do I have a ton of advice!

1) YAY TRAVEL. You'll love it. Take as long as you possibly can.

1B) Everywhere you go, people will speak English. Really. Don't worry about language problems. If you're concerned, buy one of those point-picture book things for emergencies - I bought one for my last trip to China/Mongolia (where there _are_ language difficulties in being a traveler) and it stayed in the bottom of my bag. You're used to being flexible (I'm in awe of your relief work) - and that will put you far ahead of mere mortals abroad.


2) I loved Venice and the tinytiny towns separated by OMG gorgeous valleys of olive trees, crops, and grapevines of the Tuscany region. (This pix sums up what I loved about that region - we stopped for 1h, and I could have stayed for 3d, just walking, however, the castle/town was quite touristy and probably deathly expensive; I bought the above at a little hole in the wall outside of the town that catered to locals looking for a snack: http://www.flickr.com/photos/clstal/795359103/ )
Italy pix from that trip/tour: http://www.flickr.com/photos/clstal/tags/italy/ Venice was my ABSOLUTE FAV place of the whole trip but it is heart-attack-inducingly expensive. Hotels are insanely expensive (unless you want to spend hours/frustration/getting lost/unpleasantness and stay in less central locations, food is expensive, but at least (unlike the rest of Italy, in my experience) amenable to wandering near your hotel and finding good restaurants, likely because your hotel is in a central location frequented by tourists AND locals... which makes all the difference in the world, in my opinion. This lady just got back from Venice - and might have advice on places to stay, if you're interested: http://www.yarnagogo.com/blog/2012/03/in-venice.html

3) I took the Globus tour w/ my mom a few years ago. They were great, 100% professional, accommodating, and the tour guide lady was well-suited for the task. My only complaint was that on the one or two tour-provided meals, the food sucked - the places that can accommodate a tour bus full of people don't cater to locals and therefore can serve sub-par food as long as they can do it quickly. Not the fault of the tour company, this is a problem of feeding the masses. The globus tour was _not_ food-focused, something I regret to this day and would consider a major drawback (and is the reason I'd like to go back) - we passed through so many regions famous for food/wine/whatever and those were never featured or mentioned by the tour. If you do take a tour, book yourself several days ahead of the tour so you can get over the atrocious jet lag and acclimate, so when the tour starts, you aren't miserable when you're supposed to be viewing once-in-a-lifetime artwork/places/etc. The tour place can rec a location or give you the name of the hotel where the tour starts... and you can book there or nearby using hostels.com or one of the other international hotel sites.

...

[tpau]

most folks speak english.

dont carry cash. jsut use the ATM, but call your bank and credit card company first to warn them or they may think your card was stolen.

make a scan of your passport, ptint a copy and leave with a freind and email a copy to yourself.

in Rome, beware of hordes of gypsy children. it sounds racist, but they come to you in groups with large sheets of poster board and show it to you to try to get you to buy it, and steal your bags and things where you cant see under hte board. no shit, seriously. also they try to sell you thier sisters. it was weird.

go to the art museums, all of them.

take the trains, and busses, dont bother witha tour it will be cheesy and dumb and you will miss the cool things.

go to the coleseum and go to the tunnels under it.

[fractalgeek.livejournal.com]

Italy has very different regions, almost like different countries. The train is good between cities, for the smaller historic towns driving is OK - but get a guide on the rule differences first. You will find probably find Italian roads far too fast and small. In cities - forget cars.

Get a guide like "lonely planet". Prices for food vary hugely, and away from touristy places are fine.

We had no real issue not speaking Italian around tourist attractions, and elsewhere was fine.

My $0.02

[kittyblue.livejournal.com]

Our experience in Italy - admittedly, we went a few days before a cruise and did only a brief jaunt around Rome. I recommend hopping on the city tour buses for a brief orientation, then everything else by foot or cab. (The driving looks INSANE but they will stop for you. Mom and I learned to cross the street right behind old women, who seemed to automatically get the right-of-way from all sides.) In Rome, at least, we found that the bulk of the 'big' sites were more-or-less walking distance, and the hotel we stayed at had a shuttle service to and from the center of town, about a mile from the Coliseum. INVEST in really good walking shoes. Cannot stress that enough - shoes you can wear ALL day in all temperatures, and at least a few spare pair of padded socks. Your feet will thank you.

English is pretty common - tourism is a major enough industry you'll find most places manage at least one other language.

Pickpocketing - Mom and I didn't have a problem, BUT we did invest in the Magellan travel purses, which are designed to deter theft (wires in the purse straps, mesh in the bottom and sides, zippers that clip and tuck under other flaps, etc). Durable as heck, full of handy pockets and niches, and about $60-100. Room for water bottles and a small umbrella, even! I really do recommend them. We also locked our passports in the hotel safe and carried laminated, 2/3-scale color copies in our wallets. (On the ship, they confiscate your passports once you're on board. A little nerve-wracking, to hand over your only way home, but it's a well-oiled machine.) We also locked photocopies of our cards and IDs in the safe with the passport - backup plan, in case something was stolen and we had to call, we had the numbers handy. ATMs are everywhere. Check with your bank about fees and exchange rates; some places also offer international debit cards that you can pre-load with a certain amount, if you're wary of linking to your home banking information. We used those in Spain and Portugal with no difficulties.
One trick we did hear about when it came to pickpockets was a woman with a baby and other children - she'll try to hand you the baby - don't accept!!! - while the kids rifle through your bags/pockets during the distraction. We were told to keep our purses in front, our arm across them firmly, and to never feel guilty for telling these folks no with as much conviction as we could muster. (I'm not exactly tender-hearted, so this wasn't a problem for me. I guess I don't look cuddly, either - no one approached us. ;P )
Leave copies of important documents and your itinerary with someone at home (we had a folder by the phone for the house/dog sitter) and be sure all of your banks know you will be traveling. Also handy - type up your hotels and the dates you will be there and tuck it into the luggage tag of your suitcase. If your luggage is delayed, whoever is forwarding it will know where to send it. (Also add an emergency number to the bottom of that list so someone back home can help direct your orphaned suitcase to it's necessary destination.) Magellan makes bright yellow luggage tags labeled in several languages that indicate there's an itinerary inside for lost luggage. (Handy site, they are! Lots of ideas, gadgets, etc.)

[dagibbs.livejournal.com]

Language will be less of a worry than you might think -- even when I was there 15 years ago, many people spoke some English, and anyone working in a tourist or travel related business will (at least) have functional domain-specific English.

I'm not a fan of packaged-tour stuff.

P.S. You should come to Canada for my cottage party, as an easy introduction to foreign countries! :)

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

Lonely Planet Guide. So important. Also, at least 2 months before you travel, find out about whether you need a visa, and whether you need pre-trip injections for illnesses found in those countries, or pills to prevent same.

[surakofb5.livejournal.com]

A few other items no one has mentioned yet:

In some places, you have to pay to use public toilets, so keep some change handy.

Learn a few basic phrases of Italian, but I was always surprised when I asked a question in German (where I traveled) and got answered in English.

A small phrase book can be handy. My mom made her own phrase sheet when she went to Hungary because she was in non-tourist regions. Reading menus was the one place I really wished for a dictionary. Restaurants don't always have an English version, and I got surprised a few times. But big cities are used to foreign tourists.

I did an escorted tour with Globus for the first part of my trip to Germany, then went off on my own to visit some places that are not on the tours. It gave me a chance to see a lot without having to deal with making all the arrangements for the various cities. We did have some free days in big cities on the tours, so I researched in advance how to get to the museums I wanted to see.

Europe mostly uses chip&pin credit cards, so you may run into places that have trouble with your card, but tourist areas should be okay.

Oh, Capital One is the only credit card I know if that doesn't charge a foreign transaction fee.

[hermitgeecko.livejournal.com]

My biggest suggestion:

Learn some Italian. When I was in Thailand, I was deeply comforted by having a couple phrases to fall back on, and the people around me seemed to appreciate when I made the effort.

[pryder]

I'll echo the comment about language -- in any place that gets significant numbers of tourists, people will speak enough English for you to get around.

If you're not going to do everything together, bring unlocked GSM phones (they have to work on the 900 and 1800 MHz bands so some old AT&T and T-Mobile phones won't work) and buy local SIMs or buy cheap prepaid phones there - it makes coordinating your activities a lot easier. Using American phones overseas (if you even can; most Verizon and Sprint phones won't work in Europe) is ludicrously expensive.

Driving is probably OK if you want to see the countryside, but don't even think about driving in the cities. European cities, unlike many of our US cities, are walking territory; that's the best way to see them.

[warinbear.livejournal.com]

I could have sworn I saw you at the Callahanicon in Toronto. <gentle tease> Is Canada part of the US now?