SPLENDOURS OF ITALY - Optionals Experiences

When asked whats the biggest mistake we make in life, the buddha replied: The biggest mistake is you think you have time. Time is free, but its priceless. You can't own it but you can use it. You can't keep it but you can spend it, and once it's lost, you can never get it back.

Make the Most of Your Journey

Our tour is packed with amazing sights and experiences, but if you’re looking to take things up a notch, check out the optional experiences I’ve lined up for you. These are the hidden gems—the kind of moments that turn a great trip into an unforgettable adventure.

Whether it’s diving deeper into local culture, tasting something incredible, or exploring a spot you might not find on your own, there’s something here for everyone. And the best part? You don’t need to book anything in advance. Just decide on the spot—no pressure, no hassle!

Take a look below to see what’s on offer. I’m here to answer any questions and help you choose what’s right for you. Let’s make this trip truly special!

Roman Delights with Dinner

A Night Out in the Real Rome

This isn’t a tourist version of Rome.

No red-checkered tablecloths. No staged serenades.

Tonight, you step into the Rome where Romans actually live — and eat.

The restaurant is modern, vibrant, the kind of place where conversations bounce off the walls and the smell of garlic, fresh basil, and slow-cooked sauces fills the air. No gimmicks, no performances — just honest, perfect Roman cooking.

You start with a glass of cold Prosecco and a plate of Bruschetta al pomodoro — toasted bread soaked with olive oil, topped with tomatoes that taste like they never saw a truck, just a sunbeam.

The first course is pure Roman tradition:

Spaghetti Cacio e Pepe — creamy, peppery, simple in the way only true classics can be — and Rigatoni all’Amatriciana, rich with pancetta and tomatoes slow-simmered to the edge of sweetness.

For the main, a tender grilled chicken breast, charred just enough to lock in the juices, paired with roasted peppers, oven-crisped potatoes, and a green salad sharp with lemon and olive oil.

And dessert? The kind of Tiramisu that ruins all others — rich, feather-light, made in-house by someone who knows when to stop stirring and start believing.

A quarter bottle of local wine — Chardonnay or Montepulciano — and water are included, along with the low hum of live music threading through the night.

Transportation and tips are handled. You just show up, sit down, and let Rome do what it does best: feed you like you belong.

67 EUR

Piazzas and Fountains

Rome: Where Every Step Is a Story

There are cities that age.

And then there’s Rome — a city that refuses to.

You don’t just see it. You step into it.

The stone under your shoes is worn smooth by emperors, poets, and lovers. The air hums with stories that were old before your great-grandparents were born.

The Spanish Steps rise like a lazy wave of marble, where Audrey Hepburn once slipped off her shoes and a thousand summer afternoons blurred into gold.

The Trevi Fountain roars with the voice of a thousand wishes, its stone figures locked forever in a struggle too grand to freeze. Toss a coin if you like — Rome keeps its promises in its own time.

You pause at the Pantheon, its massive columns standing against time itself, the open eye of its dome visible through the archways.

Even from the outside, the building presses its weight against the sky — a reminder that some things are built not just to last, but to defy.

And between it all — the alleys.

The cracked walls dripping ivy.

The smell of coffee and old stone.

The lives lived half inside and half outside, where a Vespa might whip past and a Vesuvian laugh might ring out from a balcony above.

You end at Piazza Navona — not a square, but a stage.

The fountains spit and glitter. Painters crowd the corners. Shadows stretch across worn cobblestones. You can sit here, if you like, order a glass of wine, and pretend you’re nobody at all. Or that you’re part of something ancient and unbroken.

In Rome, it’s easy to forget yourself.

It’s even easier to find yourself in the echoes.

49 EUR

Discover Pompeii

Pompeii: The Day the World Ended

There’s no velvet rope in Pompeii. No polished plaques telling you where to look. Just a city, gutted and frozen, waiting for anyone brave enough to see it for what it is.

Ash buried Pompeii so fast the world forgot it was there. When it finally came back to light, the details were too real to romanticize: loaves of bread still sitting in ovens. Graffiti scrawled across stone walls. Bodies caught mid-run, faces turned away from a sky they didn’t understand. Bright murals advertised wine, gladiators, and pleasures that never made it into the history books.

You don’t stroll through Pompeii — you move through it like you’re walking inside someone else’s memory. You pass taverns with their counters still chipped from customers’ elbows. You tread ruts in the stone roads where wagon wheels once wore down the city, day after ordinary day. And you feel the weight of it: how quickly everything can vanish, how loudly silence can speak.

It’s not beautiful in the way postcards try to make it. It’s beautiful because it’s human — because it shows us that life, even two thousand years ago, was vivid, messy, complicated, and painfully real.

Standing in the amphitheater, where gladiators once fought to survive, or peering into the painted gardens of a rich man’s home, you realize the people of Pompeii didn’t expect to become history. They were just living. Laughing, fighting, loving, planning for a tomorrow that never came.

Pompeii isn’t a museum. It’s a warning. It’s a mirror. It’s a story we’re still trying to finish.

60 EUR

Sorrento Countryside and Farmhouse Meal

Life on the Land, Just Above the Coast

Just beyond Sorrento’s busy waterfront lies a quieter side of the region — the hills and farmland that locals rely on but visitors rarely see. This evening, we head into that countryside for a visit to a working family farm.

It’s not a showpiece — it’s a real operation. Chickens roam, olive trees line the slopes, and everything you’ll eat is grown, made, or raised right here. We’re welcomed by Signora Maria, who prepares fresh mozzarella by hand every morning — the same cheese she sells to neighbors and local shops. Today, she’ll show us how it’s done.

We’ll tour the farm, meet the animals, and get a hands-on look at daily life. In the outdoor kitchen, you’ll see how traditional pizza is made — dough, sauce, the works — followed by a full meal cooked with ingredients straight from the land.

It’s a simple, authentic experience. No frills, no filters. Just local food, a beautiful setting, and the people who make it all happen.

75 EUR

Amalfi Coast Drive and Positano
The Road That Fell from the Sky

Long before it became Europe’s most photographed coastline, the Amalfi Coast was nearly inaccessible — a forgotten stretch of cliffs and fishing villages that could only be reached by sea. Once a proud Maritime Republic, Amalfi faded into obscurity until after World War II, when engineers carved a ribbon-thin road into the limestone cliffs. The result? A miracle of asphalt and air.

This drive — from Maiori through sun-bleached villages, lemon groves, and dizzying drops — is more than scenic. It’s surreal. Towns hang like mosaics on the rock face. The sea shifts from cobalt to silver. And always, the road winds — impossibly — onward.

In the 1950s and '60s, the coast returned to the world stage, this time in Technicolor. Sophia Loren, Rossellini, the jet set — they made this coastline mythic. But the drama never needed a script. It’s written into every switchback and overlook.

At the journey’s end lies Positano: a vertical town of ochre and coral houses, spilling down to the shore. With its cathedral dome, steep alleyways, and improbable elegance, it feels more imagined than real. But it’s very real — and undeniably captivating.

This isn’t just a drive. It’s an awakening. The kind of beauty that disorients, then stays with you.

72 EUR

Gondolas and the Grand Canal

The Water Carries More Than Reflections.

There are cities you walk through — and there are cities you glide through like a secret.

Venice is the second kind.

The Grand Canal, the spine of the old republic, still moves with the weight of centuries. Palazzos lean into the water, their marble facades cracked but proud, telling stories of when Venice was the richest, boldest city in Europe — a place that wrote its name across the maps of the world in ink, gold, and blood.

And the only way to understand it — really feel it — is from the water.

You board the speedboat, a sleek 1950s dream polished to a high shine, and suddenly you’re no longer just a visitor. You’re living a scene out of a life most people only see in movies. Bond, Clooney, the silent glances of a black-and-white film — it’s all in the air as you carve through the Grand Canal, spray kicking up at your sides, the palaces sliding past like mirages.

For a half-hour, Venice belongs to you.

Then the engine cuts, and the rhythm changes.

You step into a gondola — not for the photo, not for the cliché — but to slip quietly into the real veins of the city.

Down back canals so narrow the buildings seem to breathe against your shoulders. Past open windows where music and life leak into the water. Past arches sagging with age, past bridges worn thin by footsteps that stopped counting centuries ago.

Here, Venice drops its mask. No crowds, no noise — just the echo of the oar, the sigh of the water, the sense that if you stayed perfectly still, the past might reach out and touch you.

Later, with free time near St. Mark’s, the night opens up — a different Venice again, one you can wander as a dreamer or a king.

93 EUR

Venice's Secrets and St. Mark's Square

The City Behind the Mask

Venice was built to be hidden. A maze of alleys, bridges, and canals designed not just to enchant — but to protect. It still guards its secrets well.

This walk, guided by a Venetian local, begins where the crowds don’t go. You’ll step into quiet backstreets, across stone bridges barely wide enough for two. You’ll see how the old city functioned — and how it still does. From private wells in forgotten courtyards to homes where generations have lived without roads, Venice reveals itself slowly, in details.

You’ll learn how residents move, work, and adapt in this improbable place. Where post arrives by boat. Where high tide still dictates the rhythm of the day. Where ancient systems meet daily life.

The walk ends where Venice shows its full face: St. Mark’s Square. After the stillness, its grandeur feels earned — and different. You’ve seen the city behind the mask.

50 EUR

Lagoon Cruise with Lunch at Burano Island

The Lagoon Beyond Venice

Most people never leave Venice.

They see the crowded squares, the polished canals, the masks in the shop windows — and they think they know the city.

They don’t.

Beyond Saint Mark’s, the lagoon stretches wide and raw, dotted with islands that each carry their own story.

Mazzorbo, where vines twist low to the ground, fighting salt and wind to produce wine tough enough to survive centuries.

Sant’Erasmo, the vegetable garden of Venice, where artichokes — the pride of Livigno — grow fat and spiked under a restless sky.

San Francesco del Deserto, a monastery cut off by mist and prayer, where silence weighs heavier than water.

And then there’s Burano.

It rises like a dream from the flat blue — fishermen’s houses painted in colors so bright they punch through the fog.

Here, lace isn’t a tourist craft; it’s a living art, threaded by hands that remember harder times.

The canals are narrower, the voices louder, the life unmistakably real.

You’ll dock at Burano for more than just the view.

In a simple restaurant where locals gather, where the owners still fish the waters themselves, you’ll sit down to a seafood dinner pulled straight from the heart of the lagoon.

No menus. No pretense. Just whatever the water offered up that day — grilled, stewed, seasoned like the sea itself.

Here, away from the crowds, the lagoon doesn’t perform for anyone.

It feeds, it breathes, it endures — and if you’re lucky, for one evening, it lets you be part of its story.

86 EUR

Milan and Lake Como Splendour

From Italy’s Fashion Capital to Alpine Waters

This full-day experience moves between two very different icons of northern Italy.

The morning begins in Milan — bold, fast, and polished. It’s a city of business, design, and unapologetic style. We step into its heart at the soaring Duomo di Milano, explore the glass-and-marble glamour of the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, and pause at the legendary La Scala Opera House. From the fortress-like Castello Sforzesco to the designer storefronts, Milan reveals itself as both historic stronghold and global trendsetter.

In the afternoon, we trade stone for water.

Lake Como is quieter — softer. Surrounded by the foothills of the Alps, its deep blue surface reflects centuries of villas, cypress trees, and carefully curated charm. We board a private boat for a ride across the lake, drifting past villages that have drawn writers, royals, and Hollywood actors. The visit finishes in the town of Como, where there’s time to stroll, shop, or just take in the view.

Two worlds in one day — both unforgettable.

69 EUR

Traditional Tuscan Countryside Dinner at Fattoria Il Poggio

Tuscany Without a Mask

The land around Montecarlo is old, but it doesn’t pretend to be anything other than what it is. Rows of vines stretch across the hills, thick olive groves press up against dusty tracks, and the stones of Fattoria Il Poggio have seen more seasons than anyone can count.

The evening unfolds inside the estate’s wine cellar, a space built for work, not show. Heavy barrels line the walls. Wooden tables are worn smooth by years of meals shared and stories told. There’s no stage, no grand entrance — just the honest smell of fermenting wine, baked bread, and something roasting slow over fire.

The food comes the way it should in Tuscany: rustic, generous, unapologetic.

Plates pass from hand to hand — rough antipasti, pastas pulled deep with flavor, slow-roasted meats that taste of woodsmoke and patience. The wine, grown from the soil just outside, flows without ceremony, poured straight from the estate’s own harvest.

Music and laughter rise naturally, stitched into the rhythm of the night, not forced from a program but born from full glasses and easy company.

Nobody hurries. Nobody plays at being something they’re not.

At Fattoria Il Poggio, you don’t dine.

You take your place at a table that’s been waiting for you for centuries.

73 EUR

Visit to San Gimignano

Towers Built on Fear and Fortune

The towers rise like broken teeth against the sky — not for beauty, but for survival.

In the Middle Ages, San Gimignano wasn’t a postcard. It was a city of rival merchants, bitter feuds, and fortunes made and lost in the time it took to swing a blade.

Every family with power built upward, stone by stone, reaching for the sky in a race no one could afford to lose. The taller the tower, the greater the warning: we’re rich, we’re strong, and we’re ready to fight. A fortress, a flag, a threat — all wrapped in the cold weight of stone.

Inside the old walls, the streets still twist and climb, built not for ease but for defense. Palaces loom over narrow alleys. Shops cluster in the shade of towers built by men who trusted no one, not even their neighbors. Every corner, every brick, tells the story of ambition pressed against fear.

Climb Torre Grossa, the tallest of them all, and look out over a countryside that once carried both opportunity and danger. Beyond the fields and vines lies the same promise — and the same hunger — that built these walls.

And then, there’s the other side: the simple pleasures that somehow survived it all.

A piazza where life still spills into the streets. Artisan shops where old crafts breathe. A scoop of gelato cold against the heat, sweet enough to make you forget, for a moment, how rough survival used to taste.

In San Gimignano, history isn’t polished for show. It’s rough, proud, and still standing.

43 EUR

Arrivederci Roma Dinner

One Last Night, Together in the Eternal City

Every journey deserves a proper ending — and tonight, we gather for just that.

This farewell dinner is a chance to pause, reflect, and share one final meal in good company. After days of discovery and connection, we come together not as tourists, but as fellow travelers — bound by moments now shared.

There will be wine on the table, laughter between courses, and a few quiet glances that say more than words. It’s a celebration of where we’ve been — and a gentle nudge toward where we might go next.

Rome says arrivederci — until we meet again.

67 EUR

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