Heading from Montisi - Verona

[Jerr]

I wanted to run our travel plans past you expert travelers to see if we're missing anything.

After a couple of weeks in Tuscany in May/June we're heading north to finish off our vacation in Verona and Venice. The friends who are staying with us in Montisi will be flying home to Canada out of Florence at the end of the Tuscany portion. We'll have two cars.

Our original plan involved both groups driving to Florence and dropping the cars off. Our friends would fly home and we'd head to the train station, take the train to Bologna, switch to the train to Verona, and cab to our hotel. Then I got playing about on autoeurope and realized that for about 80 euros more we can drop the car off in Verona.

Our plan now looks like this: leaving the rental in Montisi, driving to Verona, dropping the car off, cabbing to the hotel.

It seems a whole lot easier and less stressful. Plus it looks less expensive meaning more euros for wine and gelato.

Are we missing anything that we should be considering?

 

[artnbarb]

Jerry, I'd keep the car just for the convenience - and if I might add a suggestion: we're driving from our apt neat Chiusi to Verona, but are stopping in Modena for lunch, at a restaurant I read about on Mario Batali's website: Hosteria Giusti - best meal we EVER had! (we were there in 2010, and Judy Witts says it's still the best!) You can probably read about it on my blog, or just ask me for more details!

 

[Jerr]

Thanks Barb - the convenience thing was a big one... particularly as we know we'll have a case or two of wine in tow by that point

I hadn't even thought about the interesting culinary adventures that could be had en route. Oh my!

 

[Fmax]

Sounds like verona is popular this year. I am just waiting on finding out whether friends are joining me for a week or doing their own itinerary before i book accomodation for a few days there. Going later in year (sept) so look for to reading trip reports.

Slightly off topic, how do you get your cases of wine safely back to canada. Definitely considering some purchases when i am there.

 

[Jerr]

Slightly off topic, how do you get your cases of wine safely back to canada. Definitely considering some purchases when i am there.

When I am visiting wineries in Niagara I buy wine packers called 'wine skins'. They are like bottle shaped, heavy duty zip lock bags, and lined with bubble wrap inside. We bring a bunch of these with us to Italy, put the bottles of wine we love (and know we'll never see in Ontario) in them, and pack it in our checked baggage.

When we go through customs we claim the wine. It seems the duty on wine is negligible so we get waved through. We were pulled in once and the agent got mad 'it isn't worth it for me to do the paperwork' and told us to get out of there. It is different with alcohol - the duty on that is worth it!

We have some lovely bottles waiting for us in our wine cellar this way.

 

[Fmax]

Thanks for the info, that's good to know. Will pick some wine skins up the next time I'm in Niagara.

 

[Chris]

I ordered a six pack of wine skins from Amazon.

 

[jan]

Jerry--definitely drive all the way to Verona. It would be so much less hassle than changing to the train in Florence.
About bringing wine home: I usually bring only a couple of bottles. They get wrapped in our dirty clothes in the middle of the suitcase and always make it home just fine.

 

[jan]

One more thing--We are also planning a lunch at Hosteria Giusti as we make our way by train from Florence to Venice. We will spend one night (I know it's not very slow but that's the plan) in Modena.