Northern Italy Including Cinque Terre

It was a wonderful trip - did not feel the need to see Parma ham or Parma cheese. Would have rather had opportunity for more time in Cinque Terra.

Great guide and driver. Milan hotel was not central to anything and not a great facility. No real time was spentin cinque terre or lake como and trip should be same length of time but with 2 or 3 less places to visit.

Excellent experience from beginning to end. The organization and attention to detail is greatly appreciated especially when travelling overseas. Our tour guide and driver went over and above to ensure everyone was happy and taken care of. I have already referred Trafalgar to friends and family.

If you like looking at beautiful lakes this trip has a lot of that. You spend a lot of time on boats, especially if you do the optional experiences. The tour director and bus driver were very good - as I have come to expect. All the local specialists were excellent. The downside for me was that the included activities and optional experiences were very similar. Because the cities we visited were relatively close together they didn’t vary much. It just felt like too much of the same thing . The prosciutto factory and cheese factory tours were the notable exceptions and very enjoyable. The optional farm dinner, while pricey, was a definite highlight of the trip and very worthwhile. The hotels all had comfortable beds BUT their air conditioning was very poor. The hotel in Parma had no working a/c the first night. This was a huge problem given the 100 degree heatwave with humidity that lasted the whole trip. This was my 4th Trafalgar trip and the least enjoyable. Still it’s Italy!

We visited an amazing number of venues and saw beautiful country. The weather was quite hot in August.

The itenaerary was excelent! I particularly liked that we focused on one area in one country only and stayed in each location for two nights. This way were were able to learn and see a lot without being rushed or stressed.

This was my second tour with Trafalgar. I thought the first tour (Italian Holiday) couldn't be beat. BUT the Cinque Terre tour exceeded my previous experience and expectations. Well-planned and well-paced. Included experiences were excellent and the optional experiences were worth the extra Euros. Local Specialists were superb. And, as always, our coach driver was excellent and Tour Guide, *personal info removed by Feefo* is just the very best. The beauty of Cinque Terre and the lakes is breathtaking. All the small towns were charming and welcoming. If you want to feel immersed into the slower pace and genuine culture of Italian life, this is the tour for you!

Great tour. The tour director was awesome.

Wonderful trip with lots of fun packed in the tour. It was great to see so many different aspects of the country and culture.

Our tour director *personal info removed by Feefo* was very positive and excited to show us his home country. I especially enjoyed exploring smaller villages and towns that I would have otherwise never thought to visit. I hope in the future to visit more countries with similar lesser known cities and towns.

My experience with my tour was out of the world. It was amazing and beautiful. Loved every day of the tour and *personal info removed by Feefo* our guide and our driver *personal info removed by Feefo* were so kind and the best.

Nice to see less touristy villages and scenery

GREAT TRIP SHORT BUT SEE A LOT

This trip is packed with many activities and extra excursions. We had a wonderful tour director, who made the trip very pleasant - she was a lot of fun. So much to see in a short space of time and it was well worth it. Consider the extra excursions for a real experience. I had a wonderful trip and will be using Trafalgar for my next trip to Portugal.

The Northern Italy tour was excellent. This was my first Trafalgar Tour and it was wonderful. The tour was enhanced by the tour director and the driver . I felt safe and comfortable on the bus and gave a smooth ride. was amazing, her knowledge and upbeat personality made the trip very interesting and pleasant. They are a great combination. Clearly, the Italian scenery speaks for itself! The stops on the tour were perfect with city stops and country views as well. Both the sea and lake trips gave a lovely comparison of scenery.

This was our fourth trip with Trafalgar and it was fabulous! Our tour director, Lisa, was really well organised, knowledgeable, articulate, good-humoured, efficient and caring, and our skilful driver, Stefano, ensured everyone felt safe and comfortable throughout the trip. The coach, as always, was sleek and modern; smooth and comfortable with excellent views from all seats on the daily rotation. Our itinerary was really well balanced (boat rides, coach rides, train rides, walking tours, free time; mountains, lakes, cityscapes, countryside) and, for a relatively short tour, it was incredibly well paced - we never felt rushed. We had plenty of time to wander the side-streets, shop for gifts and souvenirs, taste all the pasta and pizza, sip Aperol spritz and cool off with gelato. Our hotels were clean, comfortable and conveniently located, and the delicious included breakfasts set us up for the whole day ahead. The final hotel on Lake Maggiore had a beautiful pool where we relaxed before the long trip home to NZ. (We always book an extra night at the end of a tour - to slow down and reflect - and strongly recommend it if you have the time.) There were so many highlights that it is impossible to choose a favourite. We loved all the walking tours (the local guides, without exception, were superb) and we were so glad we signed up for all the optional extras, apart from Como (where we had already spent three days prior to the trip). The divine dinner in the countryside, panoramic train ride to the alpine village of Sant Maria Maggiore, visit to exquisite Lake Orta, tour of the extraordinarily beautiful palace on Isola Bella and everything else in between will remain etched in our memories to years to come. Everyone was great company and we made lovely new friends. It really was the happiest of holidays! Time to start saving for the next trip…

Great trip! Recommend spending 2 days in Cinque Terre and 2 days at Lake Maggiore.

The trip was incredible! The tour guide and were excellent! We highly recommend this tour!!!!

We have done many Trafalgar and Globus tours as a family of six. There were some disappointing aspects of this trip. First day in Milan, nothing was included. There were two extra activities but both were extra cost. So if you did not get the extras, essentially there was nothing part of the Trafalgar tour in Milan, you were on your own. One of the extra pay for dinners was disappointing. On previous tours, these have been great. This one was also touted as having lots of food by the travel Director. That was not the case. Portions were small and some of the dishes came out cold. The cost for my family of six was not worth the food or experience.

Beautiful itinerary with gems of Northern Italy….. lots of free time, great learning experiences, , excellent guide and bus driver!

Great itinerary! I visited places I didn’t even know existed or would have ever visited.

The written itinerary did not do the actual trip, places justice. More detail would help. Possible to add websites for traveler to research. For example, the hotels were average, contemporary, and in odd to questionable areas. Was this to control cost, accommodate the group, or availability? More historic hotels would add to the ambiance of the experience. The schedule was very busy with many optional experiences. Would have liked more free time with not having to choose between free time of optional experience. Buffet breakfast at hotels was good because of the choices. Other meals included were not as appealing. One meal choices were pesto pasta, fish, or vegetarian.

Great cities that aren't the usual tourist spots

The itinerary was amazing but the only thing was the weather didn't permit us to go on the boat ride to Lake Cuomo. I would highly recommend this tour for it's uniqueness and beauty. The visit to the Parma Ham factory and Parmesan Cheese factory was great with the tastings afterwards. The train ride to the village in the mountains was incredible. Finally, our tour director and bus driver were fun which made the entire experience memorable and enjoyable. I definitely will look for more tours with Trafalgar. Very organized and well tailored! Thank you!

There is so much to see and do in Milan and Genova. It would be good to spend 3 nights in Milan, 3 in Genova and 2 in Baveno. The nights in Milan should be at the begining and end of the tour so customers can easily extend the tour. Locations like Parma and the Cinque Terre are just a days trip from either Milan or Genova.

This was a special trip as it let me discover a less traveled part of Italy. It was beautiful and surprising! Our guide, was simply the best! She was knowledgeable, funny and caring. I would recommend this trip to anyone, especially someone who wants to see Italy in a different light than the regular touristy things.

We just returned from our trip and had a really good time. This was not our first Trafalgar tour so we were very familiar with the early morning wake up and routines. If you are not an early bird, this tour would not be a pleasant experience for you. Starhotel Tourist Milan was conveniently located next to a Metro station, however, there weren't too many restaurants nearby. If you did not sign up for the optional experience including dinner, those of us who stayed back didn't have much options for dinner unless we took the Metro somewhere. Novotel Parma Centro was conveniently located to city centre and many restaurants, however, customer service was lacking. We were there for two nights. The first night I noticed our room's air conditioning wasn't working so I called down to let them know. They said they will check their system and to call back in ten minutes. It still wasn't working after ten minutes so I called down and they said they will send someone up to take a look at it. Needless to say, they did not send anyone up. My husband and I did not have a pleasant night in our heated room with no air. The following morning after breakfast I stopped by the front desk to let them know what happened the previous night and front desk said they would send someone up to take a look at it. We left for the morning for our walking tour and when we returned the room was still hot and no air conditioning. I went down to front desk and they started with the same spiel...they will check their system, I stopped them and this time I demanded they give us a new room for our last night. We were not going to spend one more night or our last night sleeping with no air and staggering heat. Not sure why I had to pushed to the limit and look like the bad person before they would do anything. We were disappointed with the group photo we took outside of the Prosciutto factory all geared up in our hair nets and gowns. We would have appreciated a nicer photo perhaps in front of the Duomo or at Lake Maggiore. When we toured with Trafalgar last year for our Turkey trip we had a photographer take a nice picture for us at Cappadocia, not sure why we couldn't have one done for this trip from Trafalgar also. Overall we had a great trip, met some great people in our group and went to some beautiful places in Northern Italy. Our tour director was very professional, knowledgeable, caring, detail oriented and very pleasant to be around for seven days. If you are fortunate enough to have to be your tour director, you are in good hands.

Our guide was excellent!There was too much time in Manarola waiting for a ferry in extreme heat! It would have been better to get to Genoa earlier.

The tour was wonderful but it was our tour director that made the experience spectacular.

I like the mix of cities and countryside visits. The last few days in the Lake region were fabulous! Staying the last two nights in a Lake Maggiore hotel was superb! Milan and Parma were great. Parma Centro was nice and more quiet than busy Milan. I wasn’t sure about the 2 food factories visits in the countryside near Parma, but they were actually great at all levels, the learning experience and also going in the countryside near Parma. All the optional activities were fantastic. The train going to the Alps village was amazing. Cinque Terre day was good but a bit challenging to walk many uphill streets, but a unique experience!

Amazing trip; love all the excursions; must take the optional ones, worth it. Tour director was fantastic, very caring, had tremendous knowledge of the places. Hotels were very good, keep in mind that hotels in Europe are not the same as in North America in terms of stars; their 4-star is not a North America 4 star. Food was amazing. You learn a lot about the Italian culture as you are in smaller towns/cities. For me it was a wonderful experience all around.

A good amount of variety and not too busy with hordes of tourists

Far too much walking. Should have been stressed in promotion. Too many items on itinerary to do in one day. Tour director not that polite. Maybe been in the job too long. Talking for an hour and 20 minutes at 8:15 in the morning not too cool. Half the people were sleeping. When I was leaving I realized that my purse was not in the room when I went back to use the bathroom after breakfast. It was at reception. I never learned why that was and am still not happy about it. I don’t know if I will be using Trafalgar again. This trip was the second time I had used them.

I don’t feel that we got our moneys worth for what we paid. Poor selection of excursions. There were a few good ones. Felt rushed. The guide was not overly friendly and kind hurt her being rude to some people because she didn’t like their personalities which I thought was rude. I don’t believe I will ever used Trafalgar again! I’ve used other companies and they’ve gone over and above. I always heard that your Trafalgar was the best and I disagree with that 100% I would not recommend them to anyone. I will use my regular companies that I’ve used before.

I thought the itinerary was great... but there should have been more meals and extra excursions included for the price paid.

Our holiday in italy was wonderful and we will return thank you bye

Very interesting trip

Genoa was not interesting Extremely disappointed that no free water bottles were offered on bus. Every other tour group I have been on gave free water. Temp was in 90's. Only one hotel had free water in rooms. This was something that should be included

Parma and Genoa were wonderful! Local expert/tour guides were great!

Lots of walking, steps, and uneven surfaces. Excursions are good, informative and necessary on some days where there is limited included tours. First day is an overview via coach with dnner. Group dinners were below par and not enjoyable. Local tour guides were awesome. Most hotels were average with 1 very good at the end in Baveno and 1 very poor in Genoa. Coach was comfortable but a bit tight if your on the larger size.

Hotels were in bad location, not close to city center. First hotel was supposed to be in Milan and was changed to a different city. Had to take an expensive taxi to city center. Hotels were dirty, minimum furniture, very industrial looking. Included food was not as good as it used to be. Best food was when we ate on our own. Also, the guide was rude and short with the guests. Several guests said to me that they were afraid to ask a question since they may get a nasty response.

Liked the areas that we went to, but needed more excursions to pick from. There was a lot of walking involved, but every place we went was beautiful. Cinque Terre was my favorite spot.

Too much rigorous walking for some seniors. Listening devices had poor sound quality, making it difficult to understand local guides. Two hotels mediocre quality.