Italy - your favourite region/place

[WhatWouldHopperDo]

We are going to be booking a trip to Italy for next October for DHs 60th.

He knows he wants to go to Italy but not sure which area. We’ve only been to Rome.

We want scenery and relaxing rather than city and sight seeing. We’ll be going for a week and it’ll be 8 adults and 2 tweens. (happy to hire cars if we want to do different things).

Any recommendations? DH think he might like Sicily but we are a bit clueless and having started researching, everywhere looks amazing!

Following with interest! Our next trio
were likely to book is probably going to be Sicily, and more specifically, Cefalù, but open to being swayed by others’ experiences

Absolutely love Lake Como. You can do as much or as little as you want. Milan is about a 90 minute drive so can visit there too.

I love Tuscany. I usually base myself in Sienna for restaurants etc. it's a small city but large enough to people watch in the main square. Great restaurants and at night super friendly locals that will invite you for a drink and chat on their doorstep. If someone is willing to drive there are lots of wine tours to do and stunning scenery. The beach at viareggio is decent to for something different. Florence is an hours train ride away too. Can you tell it's my favourite part of the world?

For scenery and relaxing what about Umbria or La Marche?

Both stunning and a lot less busy than Tuscany - it was very obvious when we crossed the border into Tuscany as suddenly it was heaving!

Plus lots of cute lovely towns, plenty of sightseeing if you want it.

I was going to say Lake Como too, I had a fabulous few days in Menaggio in September.

Go to Como early one morning & catch the funicular up the mountain before it gets crowded.

The tourist boats get packed later in the day so best to catch those early too, though the ferries are great for zipping between Varenna, Bellaggio & Menaggio.

Am not sure if you would count Venice as sightseeing? It's lovely just wandering around.

However for a party of 10 I'd be looking for an agriturismo, preferably one that has a restaurant as well.

I would second Umbria and Le Marche. Also Abruzzo. All have mountains, beautiful countryside, characteristic villages and coastline - the latter except for Umbria. With climate change it’ll still be warm in October (it was 26° this year in northern Italy the 3rd week of October). Otherwise Puglia. Get a masseria inland and if you have a car it’s easy to visit the countryside and the coast.

Florence is one of my favourite places in the world, I have been several time and always love it. Watch the sun set over the city from the Piazzale Michelangelo.

For scenery and relaxing in October the obvious places are Tuscany and Umbria, but it's getting quite autumnal in late October (assuming you mean Oct half-term), so how warm do you want it to be and do you want to be able to swim outdoors? If so, I'd recommend Sicily, which is (usually) lovely in Oct. We've swum in the sea at exactly that time of year and it was a like warm bath. I assume that Puglia would be similar, although I've never been there.

It's all stunning! In Tuscany you can do Florence, Pisa, Lucca and Sienna and there's an excellent train service if you want to explore further afield.

I love the Cinque Terra in Liguria, but that more a place for walking, and the walks are quite strenuous.

Having said that, you can take a little train along the coast from village to village. The villages are gorgeous and the scenery spectacular.

It is also fairly easy to get to places like Lucca and Pisa on the train, if you fancy a day in a small Tuscan city.

Assisi. Even with all the pilgrims I would happily live there.

Puglia

We stayed in Cadenabbia, directly across from Bellaggio. Visited Menaggio and Varenna too, beautiful.

We did Como this year. It was rammed with tourists and you can't really enjoy the lake as such. Same for Cinque Terra.

My favourite place in Italy is Naples. I love it.

Lake Maggiore. Boat trips to islands and walks up the mountains. May not be that warm in October though. Risk with the coastal resorts is the influx of tourist groups from cruises, swamping the small towns.

Absolutely Sicily in October! My fav place 🥰 Mondello if you're flying to Palermo. Taormina or Castelmola if you're flying to Catania and you can use the cable car to get down to the gorgeous beaches at Mazzaro or Isola Bella. And a trip up Mount Etna of course!

Thanks so much everyone. Loads of ideas for me to research which is great because holiday research is my favourite autumn hobby!!

I’m able to go in school holidays which I think probably makes things a lot easier. Although it was still a lot better to get to places I wanted to go as early as possible - there was hardly any queue for the funicular when I went up but when I got back down it was heaving.

Sardinia is a great choice for October for scenery and relaxing.

Heated swimming pool ,although the sea can still be warm enough in October in Sardinia to swim in still.
I also love the area around Lucca or Siena in northern Italy -but it's not so likely to be warm and probably more sightseeing at this time of year. Otherwise I'd head to the south- perhaps Puglia.

We went to Taormina and Ortigia in Sicily end of September - it was wonderful. First time in Sicily and we will definitely go back. Other favourites are Stresa on Lake Maggiore and Cinque Terre as already mentioned. We stayed in Sestri Levante last time and got the train up and down the coast. The 5 villages can get quite busy. Also Ischia - much quieter than Sorrento and Capri, though you can do boat trips to both. Ischia Blu apartments are probably one of the nicest places I've stayed. I really liked Naples, but it is really busy. Pompeii and Herculaneum are well worth visiting. Next year I want to go to Matera and Puglia in May, but I think we might go back to Sicily in September - Maybe Taormina for a few days and then Cefalu or a trip to Aeolian Islands.

Taormina is built on the side a cliff though so you need to be careful when looking at accommodation if you don't want to walk up and down steep hills/steps all the time. We had a lovely apartment near the Teatro Greco

Lake Como is amazing. Sardinia is lovely too and nice beaches if you like that. But from your OP I'd definitely say Como. Bellagio is my favourite and you can get the boat over to the other towns too

@Frenchfancy

I'm a bit late to this thread but it is so lovely to hear that someone else adores Naples. People get silly about it but it really is the heart and soul of Italy and (on a greedy note) the food is fantastic!