Itinerary
The breakdown: 3 days in Paris, 2 days in Nice, 3 days in Florence, and 4 days in Rome.
If I could change anything, I would’ve skipped Nice and gone straight from Paris to Florence to spend more time in either city. The French Riviera is beautiful, but is more of its own separate vacation. Overall, France and Italy are super ugly and you probably shouldn’t go.
Cost: This trip is a good example of the money-saving one-way ticket buying strategy: I found a trans-Atlantic flight from Boston to Copenhagen during the high season that was $200, and a few months later found a flight back that left out of Rome for $200. You’re saying ‘fuuuuuuck’ because $400 is the emoji of money flying away x6, and you’re right. It was the first and the last time I ever spent that much money on a flight/traveled during the high season. BUT roundtrip tickets in the high season easily reach $700-$800 so I took what I could get.
Accommodations: We probably spent $500 total on Airbnbs, and when you can book them all piece by piece, its very manageable. It might have been even less than that. Don’t waste your time booking overpriced hotels in big cities like the ones in this itinerary. Hostels are fun if you’re up for it, but otherwise we stayed in an Airbnb in every single city we went to and it was perfect. They are hosted by locals who know where you should go for non-tourist ridden fun. It was safe, clean, and we had zero problems with any of our locations.
Travel with Friends: My houseboat came because he doesn’t trust me with maps which is sexist but was also 100% necessary — Either way this split our costs in half. In Rome we split even more because we met up with two more friends.
If you can choose when to go: plan for April to mid-June, and September to October. It would be sweater weather in Paris and basically room temperature in Italy, so you won’t be able to tell where you end and pasta begins.
Paris
Getting There: flight from Boston to Copenhagen, and from Copenhagen, I found a $50 flight to Paris. And can I just say, European airports are the fucking FUTURE and American airports are actual garbage in comparison? Salad bars and fresh pressed juice everywhere you look. The end.
Overview: We had three days in Paris and I would’ve rather thrown myself into the river Javert-style than leave (I will now attempt to keep the Les Mis analogies to a minimum). We spent a lot of time walking along the river front on a gelato vision quest and riding rented bikes around everywhere. There are in fact old men playing accordions everywhere, random Ferris wheels to jump on, and dinner cruises you can board whenever you want down the River Seine.
**Anticipate being ghosted by the French if you do not attempt to speak their language: if you make even a slight effort, like learning how to ask for an English menu in French, the difference in their regard for you is like night and day**
Where We Stayed:
We split the $70/night to stay in a nice Airbnb studio in Saint Germain (view above) that was a 10 minute walk from everything.
**Do NOT try and stay near the Eifel tower, it is far from everything you are going to want to do in Paris. Champs-Élysées should also NOT be a selling point when picking your apartment. Think of Notre Dame cathedral as more of a central point to navigate around.**
What We Did:
Climbed to the top of the Notre Dame Cathedral: truth be told we never actually went inside the cathedral. IVE SEEN HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME OK and I have no interest in being burned alive for being the gypsy I am. This climb is not for the faint of heart, we lost a lot of good men (mostly high fashion Asian moms and their kids with poor footwear choices) on the way to the top. If this staircase was located in the United States, they would’ve made us wear helmets and harnesses. That view tho (above). You get to walk a complete 360 around the top and see the bells ring.
Bike tour of the city: this was probably the best/coolest way to get acquainted with and learn some history of the city without getting on one of those big, red, nerd-wagons (hop-on hop-off double decker buses). Paris has dedicated bike lanes completely apart from the roads with their own traffic lights, so it wasn’t stressful. Just think of the sweet Instas. If you don’t know how to ride a bike just run really fast and you should be fine?
Picnic at the Louvre: Our friends who had just been to Paris had recommended we do this, and they will now be the god parents of my first born child. There are meat and cheese shops everywhere, so you just buy enough to clog your own arteries and the arteries of everyone around you, and some baked goods. The owner at the shop we went to didn’t speak English, so I vaguely gestured to everything and was very happy with the results. The gardens outside the museum were designed by the same person who designed the gardens at Versailles Palace, so if you don’t have time for that excursion just do this instead.
Obligatory Louvre and Musee d’Orsay walkabout: Full disclosure: all of my pictures of the Louvre were of the hoards of people trying to get a picture of the Mona Lisa (not art), the cool balconies outside (no art out there), and the ruins of the castle that are still intact under the museum itself (definitely no art). You could spend a week at the Louvre and not see everything. We liked the Musee d’Orsay way better: they had all the Picaso’s and Monet’s, it was easier to navigate, the building had some sweet ass views through a giant clock tower, and was in general just cooler for the unrefined lay people of the world.
Eifel tower at night: this was the only place that we had to take an Uber (yes Uber will work for you in Paris) because it was pretty far from everything. You will need to go through a lot of security before you are let through the gate, and then you have get in line after to pay for the elevator to the top. Its a whole fucking process. You will also have to pay for an elevator to get back DOWN because what the fuck. When the light show starts while you’re up there, approximately 98 couples will get engaged. Its a god damn free for all: GUARD YOUR LOINS.
Sainte-Chapelle chapel: I know everyone wets their pants over famous old churches and stained glass, and this is essentially a mini-Notre Dame if you’re not feeling like waiting in line for 4 hours to get inside the actual cathedral of Notre Dame. We got our ‘old church’ fix in with this chapel and called it a day. It was damn beautiful.
Nice (French Riviera – Cote d’Azur)
Getting There: We took the train down to Nice from Paris and it was disgustingly pretty. Makes me want to vomit just thinking about it. It took the better part of a day but was very worth it. The south of France is glorious and you shouldn’t waste your time in an airport to get there.
Overview: We went mainly to have a chill beach day between traveling to Florence from Paris. We had only one and a half days to explore and then get going to Florence.
Where We Stayed: We found a cheap Airbnb about two/three blocks from the boardwalk. Anything closer than that is going to cost you your left kidney and a sea witch will take your voice. The elderly Brazilian owner was spectacular. He picked up food for us every morning from the bakery, and when we were checking out he tried to give us EVERYTHING in his house including all his food and even his sponges (?) because he thought we could use them. He is a national treasure.
What We Did:
The beaches in Nice are ass cheek to ass cheek crowded in the high season and are also not sand beaches (big soft rocks instead, people bring yoga mats instead of towels). The best thing to do is spend $12 to rent one of the lounge chairs on a privately owned area of a beach (above). Anyone can rent these chairs: they come with free towels and umbrellas, have their own bars and restaurants, as well as clean bathrooms and showers. I was extremely paranoid about bringing all of our stuff to a crowded beach just to have it get stolen while we were swimming, and this solved all our problems.
We also hiked up to Parc du Mont Boron, Castle Hill, and the Promenade du Paillon which was very cool. The views are mainly of all the yachts in the harbor that you can’t even afford to spit on, but there are some neat parks and waterfalls on the way to the top of these hikes. I also saw a doggo up there. Highlight of the trip, tbh.
Florence
Getting There: Again, the train from Nice to Florence. This was another 6-ish hour long ride that we enthusiastically consented to.
Overview: This was by far our favorite part of the entire trip. Florence way out-performed Paris and even Rome. If we could have stayed there for the entire two weeks, we would have. Go to Florence go to Florence go to Florence. The city is beautiful: the gravity of Florence’s history was overwhelming, the Tuscan countryside was outrageous, and you can eat your weight in cured meats.
Where We Stayed: We found a studio apartment on the south side of the river right in front of the Boboli Gardens. Think of the north side of the river as the popular, busy, Duomo side and the south side as the Gusto’s pizza, chill, quiet side where the locals live. Even on the south side, our walk over the famous Ponte Vecchio bridge to the city center took less than 10 minutes.
What We Did:
The Boboli Gardens and the Forte di Belvedere
Everyone and their Italian mother is going to tell you that you HAVE to go to Piazzale Michelangelo for the BEST views of the whole city. Gurl. This is a bold faced lie. A LIE. The Boboli Gardens are closer to the city than the Piazzale is and has a much better view without all the insane crowds (above). The gardens used to be owned by the Medici family, the original Great Gatsbys, and are swanky as hell. The Forte di Belvedere at the top of the gardens is basically a mini castle turned into a cool art exhibition. Did I mention is has a BAR at the top where you can buy sangria? THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
Wine Tour
Get drunk at 10am! Florence is in the middle of wine country (above), and we took a trip out to the Chianti Classico region of Tuscany to pretend to be adults and wine taste. We got ham sauced with a couple of Greeks and it was what Lizzie McGuire’s pre-pubescent dreams were probably made of.
The Duomo
The Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore, the Duomo (above), is the main church of Florence. Its located in the Piazza del Duomo which is basically the dead center of the city. The whole thing is made of marble because why the fuck not. You will need something to cover your knees and shoulders to go inside, but you definitely need to buy a ticket to climb to the top of the dome. This climb is one of the scariest and most unorganized journeys you will ever go on — the trials and tribulations were similar to that of the obstacles protecting the Sorcerer’s Stone in Hogwarts, BUT you should just fucking go:
Museum Tour – Statue of David
You can’t go to the heart of the Renaissance and nix the museums from your to-do list. The Galleria dell’Accademia is where the statue of David is kept, and on a tour you’ll learn that Michelangelo was a freaking rascal as a kid. His Vines would have been off the charts. Museum tours mean you get to enter through a separate, less crowded, entrance with your guide, then a mini historical tour of the city as a whole. This is definitely worth the super nerdy headset you have to wear to hear your tour guide.
BONUS TIP: If you see a bakery or any kind of shop selling cannolis in the front of the store: STOP. They are gigantic, nasty, and left there for days at a time to attract your innocent eyes. You have to ask for a fresh one, if they can’t make you a fresh one do not eat there. Most gelato shop owners agree that the cannolis are kept back in the kitchen — you won’t even know they have them unless you ask.
Rome
Getting There: the high speed train from Florence to Rome is less than two hours!
Overview: All I remember about Rome was all the food I ate. Its all a blur of Pizza and Pasta and Prosciutto (all proper nouns now). Rome is another very walkable city, with the quieter, local end being on the west side of the river.
Where We Stayed: We met up with some friends in Rome, and we all split an Airbnb relatively close to the Trevi Fountain for the sake of being central.
What We Did:
Colosseum and Palatine Hill
We needed to pay our respects to Russell Crowe. Most tours will include a brief walk around Palatine Hill which is a very cool city of ruins right outside the Colosseum that used to be pagan as all shit (you can see the Colosseum in the far right of the photo of the Hill). If you can spring for it, do an underground access tour of the Colosseum. The entire time we were there, all we wanted to do was explore the pit and all the underground chambers. Go as early as possible, and if you’re not doing a tour, make sure to buy ‘skip the line’ passes.
Food Tour in the Prati District
I still dream about this tour. I look for these bad boys in every country I go to now: its the best way to get acquainted with that weird shit on the menu you don’t know how to pronounce. We learned SO much about how to spot authentic, homemade, Italian delicacies. And by that, I mean booze flavored gelato, different kinds of pasta, FIVE (?!?) kinds of prosciutto, homemade mozzarella, THRICE BAKED pizza, cheese plates, wine tastings, and a shit ton more. I didn’t stop to take pictures of any of it — it was in my face hole too damn fast. Pinkies up, bitch.
Trevi Fountain at Night
Like the Eifel Tower, this place is better at night all lit up. And like the Eifel Tower, 98 people once again will get engaged. I feel very badly for every guy who proposes after the first guy. You just hear random clusters of people clapping every 7 minutes for dudes on one knee. I repeat: GUARD YOUR LOINS.
Bansky Exhibit
We ran into this place totally by accident. There was nothing outside this exhibit to even hint that dozens of Bansky paintings were on display inside. My advice would be to Google what exhibitions are going on other than all the traditional galleries that are obviously there.
Pantheon
This was a quick in and out (that’s what she said). Its free to walk inside so it was very quick to pop in and see everything and pretend to know what it all meant.
Castel Sant’Angelo
This is a huge fucking castle for my castle nerds out there. This bad boy is connected to St. Peter’s Basilica for use as a fortress, a prison, but also an alternative residence for the old popes and emperors? I see far too many interior design conflicts with this undeceive fiend, but the best view (above) of the city can be found at the top (save for maybe the view from the top of the Basilica which is expensive to get to).
Vatican & Vatican Museum
It is HELLA expensive to explore the Vatican anywhere other than the main floor. Also, you have to cover your knees and shoulders or they wont even let you in the pavilion outside the basilica. Rat bastards. It is spectacular inside, but eventually your pupils go snow-blind from all the gold (above). The Vatican museum is a whole separate thing, and while you’re waiting in line, scalpers will try and sell you ‘skip the line’ passes until you want to go coffin shopping. The only reason everyone goes is to see the Sistine Chapel. In said Chapel, a man on a loud speaker will constantly scream about being quiet and not taking pictures. The irony is perfect.