Sicilia!
9 DAYS
Rome 2 • Sorrento 2 • Taormina 1 • Palermo 2
Basic Inclusions
Accommodations
Accommodations in centrally-located three-star or four-star hotels. Rooming on a triple basis. Double rooms: $50 per night, per person.
Meals
All breakfasts. All dinners. Dinner with music on Day 3.
Transportation
Round-trip transportation on scheduled airline. Deluxe touring motorcoach. All public transportation tickets included where applicable.
Guide
Services of a specially-trained passports Tour Director throughout. All tips are included in the Program Cost. Whisper headsets included.
Travel Protection
Passports provides and pays for a Post Departure Travel Protection Plan that includes coverage for Trip Interruption, Trip Delay, Medical Expense and Evacuation and more.
Tour Summary
Itinerary Includes
Unlimited public transportation
Days 1-2: Home - Rome
Arrival transfer
Visit to the Pantheon
Stroll on Piazza Navona
Day 3: Rome
Rome City Sightseeing: 24-hour public transportation pass in Rome, Local Guide, Visits to the Colosseum and the Roman Forum, Visit to the Vatican Museums, Headset receiver for the Vatican sites, Visit to the Sistine Chapel, Visit to St. Peter's Basilica
Dinner with music
Day 4: Rome - Sorrento
Visit to the Naples National Archaeological Museum, Local Guide, Visit to the excavated Roman city of Pompeii
Day 5: Sorrento
Excursion to Capri: Round trip shuttle to the port, Ferry Sorrento-Capri, Round-trip Capri funicular, Visit to Capri's Gardens of Augustus, Ferry Capri-Sorrento
Day 6: Sorrento - Taormina
Ferry to Messina
Day 7: Taormina - Palermo
Visit to the Valley of the Temples in Agrigento
Day 8: Palermo
Half-day city sightseeing in Palermo and Monreale: Local Guide, Visit to Monreale Abbey Cloister and Cathedral with audioguide
Day 9: Departure
Departure transfer
UNPARALLELED STANDARD OF EXCELLENCE
Detailed Itinerary
Days 1-2: Arrival, Pantheon, Piazza Navona
Rome is your destination; a wide-bodied jet is your vehicle. Swoop down over the Alps and touch down on the wide concrete runway at Fiumicino Airport. You've arrived in Italy!
Proceed to your centrally-located hotel, settle in and get ready to explore your surroundings.
If your schedule allows, consider a visit to the Trevi Fountain, one of Rome's most celebrated sights, which was the terminus of the Aqua Virgo aqueduct. Throw a coin over your right shoulder and into the spray to ensure your return to this wonderful city!
Inside the "Temple to All the Gods," you will understand why it has been called one of the better-preserved and most harmonious monuments of antiquity.
Walk through the plaza built on the site of Domitian's Stadium. Lined with grand buildings and trendy cafes, this oblong square is adorned with statues and fountains, notably Bernini's Fountain of the Four Rivers.
Overnight: Rome
Day 3: Rome City Sightseeing, Dinner with Music
Set out on a sightseeing tour of Rome.
A full-day local guide, well-educated and specially-trained on the history and culture of Rome, will accompany your group.
Walk through the best known monuments of Ancient Rome, the Colosseo and the Foro Romano. Once the heart of a vast empire, the Forum was filled with extravagant buildings and crowded with people from all over the known world.
Discover outstanding masterpieces collected for the Vatican Museums since the early 1500s. See exceptional statues from antiquity, such as Laocoön and His Son and the Apollo Belvedere, as well as stunning Renaissance paintings, notably the The School of Athens fresco in the Raphael Rooms.
Marvel at Michelangelo's Last Judgment and brightly-colored ceiling frescoes in the Cappella Sistina.
Enter the sanctuary recognized as the world's largest church. The Basilica di San Pietro also houses priceless works of art, in particular Michelangelo's Pietà and Bernini's Dove of the Holy Spirit.
Tonight, enjoy dinner while local singers and musicians entertain you with O Sole Mio, Volare and other favorite Italian songs.
Overnight: Rome
Day 4: Naples, Pompeii, Sorrento
Board your coach and travel south on the autostrada to the Bay of Naples.
Visit the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, one of the world's great museums of Greek and Roman antiquities, housed in an impressive 16th-century palace. It holds ancient statuary, including the Sosandra Aphrodite and the Artemis of Ephesus, a fabulous collection of mosaics from Pompeii, artwork from the Villa Pison at Herculaneum, and more.
A full-day local guide, well-educated and specially-trained on the history and culture of Pompeii and Naples, will accompany your group.
Walk through the Roman city recognized by UNESCO as a treasure of Western Civilization. See how well-to-do Romans lived 2,000 years ago, until Mt. Vesuvius all at once destroyed this city in one day and preserved it for all time.
Continue to the fabled town of poets and sunsets, also renowned for its embroidery and intarsia (wood-inlay).
The evening is free to enjoy Sorrento's scenic delights and spectacular views. For the finest overlook of all, you may want to go to Punta di Sorrento and watch the sunset from the belvedere.
Overnight: Sorrento
Day 5: Excursion to Capri
Descend the winding road to the port of Sorrento.
A ferry will take you to the Isle of Capri.
Transfer by funicular to the town of Capri's main square (Piazzetta), passing tropical gardens on the way. On the island stands Villa Jovis, the imperial residence from which Tiberius once ruled his empire. Recall tales of the Emperor Augustus, and of the mischievous Caligula.
From Capri's Piazzetta, it's an easy walk to the Gardens of Augustus, a magnificent public garden landscaped in the 1930s by the German industrialist Friedrich Krupp. Its terraces adorned with colorful and fragrant vegetation are perched atop a cliff with a sheer drop to the sea. The gardens face Capri's southern coast and provide splendid views of the 14th-century Charterhouse of San Giacomo, the Bay of Marina Piccola, down below, and the Faraglioni, the needle-like rocks that soar above the sea.
Board a ferry bound for Sorrento.
Overnight: Sorrento
Day 6: Reggio, Ferry to Messina, Taormina
Today, enjoy a scenic ride through Calabria to the city of Reggio, the very toe of Italy.
Board a ferry for the short crossing of the Strait of Messina to Sicily, the great melting pot of the Mediterranean world. Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans, Saracens, Normans, French and Spanish have all left their marks here and contributed to a rich heritage.
Travel to the medieval city of Taormina, perched high above the sea.
Settle into your hotel and luxuriate in one of Europe's most popular beach resort areas, situated in the shadow of 10,780-foot-high Mt. Etna, Europe's most active volcano. Its chimney is believed to reach thirty miles deep into the earth.
Overnight: Taormina
Day 7: Agrigento, Palermo
Travel through the hilly Sicilian hinterland, covered with pine and eucalyptus woods, then down through vineyards and olive groves towards the coast. Agrigento, Carthage's trade partner in antiquity, is the birthplace of both the ancient Greek philosopher Empedocles and the modern Italian playwright Luigi Pirandello.
Explore the exceptional site known as the Valley of Temples, since nine of the ten temples built there in antiquity are still visible. They are the remnants of a city that the 5th-century BC Greek poet Pindar called "the most beautiful city built by mortal men." The Temple of Zeus, though never completed, was considered the Eighth Wonder of the Ancient World.
Continue to Sicily's capital city, which once rivaled Córdoba in Oriental splendor.
Overnight: Palermo
Day 8: Palermo City Sightseeing
Enjoy a sightseeing tour highlighting Palermo's landmarks. See the Piazza Bellini, a delightful square with Moorish features, the lively Via Roma and the Norman Palace.
A half-day local guide, well-educated and specially-trained on the history and culture of Palermo, will accompany you today.
You will stop at Monreale, the site of a 12th-century Benedictine abbey. There, visit the dazzling cathedral to view 6,000 square yards of multicolored mosaics (chiostro) representing the complete cycle of the Old and New Testaments.
The afternoon is unscheduled.
Check out the Vucciria, the maze of side streets around Piazza Domenico, crowded with produce vendors and a myriad of food stalls; the perfect place to have lunch!
Shop for souvenirs at the Via Papireto flea market, where you may see Sicily's famous painted carts.
Overnight: Palermo
Day 9: Departure
Most good things must come to an end. Your suitcase full of memorabilia and of photos ready to be processed, you'll arrive home later today, eager to share your discoveries with family and friends.
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Visit to the Pantheon
Visits to the Colosseum and the Roman Forum
Visit to the excavated Roman city of Pompeii
Sorrento, Italy
Excursion to Capri
Taormina, Sicily
Palermo City Sightseeing
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