Donald Strachan - Frommers Easyguide to Rome, Florence and Venice 2014

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ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Stephen Keeling has been traveling to Italy since 1985 (when a serving of gelato was 1,000 lire) and covering his favorite nation for Frommers since 2007. He has written for the Independent, Daily Telegraph, and various travel magazines; has authored the award-winning Frommers family travel guide to Tuscany and Umbria; and researched numerous travel guides in Europe, Asia, and the Americas. Stephen lives in New York City.

Donald Strachan is a writer and journalist who has written about Italy for publications worldwide, including National Geographic Traveler, The Guardian, Sunday Telegraph, The Independent, and others; see www.donaldstrachan.com.

ABOUT THE FROMMERS TRAVEL GUIDES

For most of the past 50 years, Frommers has been the leading series of travel guides in North America, accounting for as many as 24 percent of all guidebooks sold. I think I know why.

Although we hope our books are entertaining, we nevertheless deal with travel in a serious fashion. Our guidebooks have never looked on such journeys as a mere recreation, but as a far more important human function, a time of learning and introspection, an essential part of a civilized life. We stress the culture, lifestyle, history, and beliefs of the destinations we cover and urge our readers to seek out people and new ideas as the chief rewards of travel.

We have never shied from controversy. We have, from the beginning, encouraged our authors to be intensely judgmental, criticalboth pro and conin their comments, and wholly independent. Our only clients are our readers, and we have triggered the ire of countless prominent sorts, from a tourist newspaper we called practically worthless (it unsuccessfully sued us) to the many rip-offs weve condemned.

And because we believe that travel should be available to everyone regardless of their incomes, we have always been cost-conscious at every level of expenditure. Although we have broadened our recommendations beyond the budget category, we insist that every lodging we include be sensibly priced. We use every form of media to assist our readers and are particularly proud of our feisty daily website, the award-winning Frommers.com.

I have high hopes for the future of Frommers. May these guidebooks, in all the years ahead, continue to reflect the joy of travel and the freedom that travel represents. May they always pursue a cost-conscious path, so that people of all incomes can enjoy the rewards of travel. And may they create, for both the traveler and the persons among whom we travel, a community of friends, where all human beings live in harmony and peace.

Arthur Frommer

I taly is a country that needs little fanfare to introduce it. The mere word conjures up vivid images: the noble ruins of ancient Rome, the paintings and palaces of Florence, the secret canals and mazelike layout of Venice. For centuries, visitors have headed to Italy looking for their own slice of the good life, and these three cities supply the highpoint of any trip around the country.

Nowhere in the world is the impact of the Renaissance felt more fully than in its birthplace, Florence, the repository of artistic works left by Masaccio, Botticelli, Leonardo, Michelangelo, and many others. Much of the known world was once ruled from Rome, a city supposedly founded by twins Romulus and Remus in 753 B.C. Its fortunes have fallen, of course, but it remains a timeless city.

How much time should you allocate for the capital? We like the story told by Thomas Hoving, ex-director of the New York Met: When a tourist asked art historian Bernard Berenson how much time to allow, he tartly replied, 57 years. Theres no place with more artistic monumentsnot even Venice, a seemingly impossible floating city that was shaped by its merchants and centuries of trade with the Byzantine world further east.

And theres more. Long before Italy was a country, it was a loose collection of city-states. Centuries of alliance and rivalry left a legacy dotted across the hinterlands of these three great cities, and much of it lies within easy reach on day trips. It is a short hop from the former maritime republic to the Venetian Arc: Verona, with its romance and its intact Roman Arena; and Padua and its sublime Giotto frescoes. In Siena, the ethereal art and Gothic palaces survive, barely altered since the citys heyday in the 1300s. The eruption of Vesuvius in A.D. 79. preserved Pompeii under volcanic ash for 2 millennia. It remains the best place to get close-up with the world of ancient Rome.

ITALYS best AUTHENTIC EXPERIENCES

Dining Italian style: The most cherished pastime of most Italians is eatingand each region and city has its own recipes handed down through generations. If the weather is fine and youre dining outdoors, perhaps with a view of a medieval church or piazza, youll find the closest thing to food heaven. Buon appetito!

Catching an opera at Veronas Arena: Summertime opera festivals in Verona are produced on a scale more human than those in such cities as Milanand best of all, they are held under the stars. The setting is the .