Day 1: Venice

Airport car pick up: VCE (Marco Polo International) 

Flight details: DUB 16:40 VCE 20:20

Park your car at the Tronchetto parking garage (approx. daily rate €20) and take a water boat to your hotel.

Check into the hotel selected and have the rest of the day free to explore the capital of the region of Venetia. Overnight Stay.

Day 2: Venice

Continue your exploration of this beautiful city. What was one of the most important republics on the Mediterranean is today one of the most important tourist destinations in the world. From all epochs of its long history, the city has conserved buildings of formidable beauty, among them innumerable churches and palaces. Today, many of the city's palaces remain in private hands, but an important percentage of them are still open to the public as exposition halls and museums. Extensive commerce with the most exotic places towards the end of the Middle Ages sensitized the Venetians to aesthetics little seen and integrated into traditional Western tastes. This aesthetic sensitivity was transformed into the spectacular beauty of this canal-laced city. Gondola rides at sunset and a romantic candlelight dinner in a fine restaurant are, undoubtedly, moments that will dwell forever in the mind of any visitor. Overnight stay.

Day 3: Venice - Padova (Padua) - Verona 122km

Enjoy breakfast at your hotel and proceed to pick up your rent a car for your drive into the countryside. An hour southwest will take you to Padova (Padua). Although the city was one of the most prosperous of Imperial Rome, little remains of the ancient Roman city, Patavium. From the beginning of the 15th century until the end of the 18th, the city belonged to the Venetian Republic. This historical and political affiliation explains much of the similarities that exist in the artistic realm between these two cities. In the Capilla degli Scrovegni, of 1303, you should not miss the series of 39 frescos painted by the genius Giotto. But what attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors each year to this city is, above all else, the San Antonio Basilica. In addition to the majesty of the structure itself, raised in the traditional Romanesque-Gothic style between 1232 and 1300, and which brings to mind the San Marcos Basilica of neighboring Venice, there are superb works of art in its interior such as the Capilla del Santo, where the remains of Saint Anthony are buried. After you leave Padua, an hour's drive will put you in Verona. After you have checked into the hotel selected, we recommend you stroll about the city's ancient quarter. This city of Romeo and Juliet has a great deal to offer visitors. You might begin with the Piazza delle Erbe, set over a Roman forum from where justice was served and laws decreed. Next, but by no means least is that which has given the city world renowned, its celebrated Roman Arena, an amphitheater with capacity for 25,000 spectators, which in its day was one of the largest in the Empire. Today, during the summer, it is used as site for the city's famed Opera festival. From the upper row, on a clear day, you can see the Alps in the distance. In addition to monuments, Verona also offers a wide selection of restaurants and an animated nightlife. Overnight stay.

Day 4: Verona - Como 171km

Breakfast. Spend the early morning continuing your visit of Verona and then depart for a 2-hour drive to Como. The first sight of the dramatic expanse of azure-hued Lake Como, ringed by gardens and forests and backed by the snowcapped Alps will inspire you. Like the other Italian Lakes, Lake Como has been popular as a resort since the days of the Roman Empire. Visitors ever since have admired the blue waters and relaxed in luxurious villas in the wooded lakeside slopes above. Como is a lively and pleasant town with an appealing historical center and a scenic location at the southern end of the east branch of Lake Como. The impressive cathedral ( Duomo), like most in Italy, was built and added to over a period of centuries, so you can admire Gothic and Renaissance features including some fine tapestries and paintings. The town's earlier cathedral (built in the tenth century), San Fedele, is another fine sight, as are the tall nine-hundred-year-old gateway, Porta Vittoria, and the Romanesque church Sant'Abbondio. The town's art gallery ( Pinacoteca) is also worth a visit. For a short trip out of town, take the funicular up to the top of the hill above Como, where you can enjoy spectacular views.

Day 5: Como

Breakfast. Continue your visit of Como. Lake Como served as a backdrop for the romantic scenes in Star Wars II: Attack of the Clones -- one of the very few settings in the film that was not created entirely by CGI computer programs. Today. You may also want to take a lovely drive around the lake to Bellagio. It is a beautiful hilly town in a picture-perfect location on the promentory where Lake Como separates into two branches. The town is historic and charming, with promenades, stately hotels and gardens open to the public, including Villa Serbelloni.

Day 6: Como - Milan 53km

Breakfast. Less than an hour of driving today and you will be in Milan. Milan is Italy's window on Europe, its most sophisticated and high-tech metropolis. In the 1700s, the Habsburgs dominated Milan, a legacy that left it with scores of neoclassical buildings in its inner core and an abiding appreciation for music and work. You will want to visit the celebrated Duomo, a Gothic cathedral in white marble and with esoteric pinnacles and flying buttresses that is situated in the center of the city. Be sure to climb to the terraces of the cathedral, an unforgettable experience that is offered in few cathedrals in Europe. Close by, you will come upon the sober and world famous Scala Theatre. If you are an art lover, you will want to visit the Brera and Ambrosiana painting museums, which house some of the best collections in the country. Milan is also one of Europe's top shopping cities, with an incredible concentration of sophisticated, high style boutiques -- and that's only fitting because Milan is the dynamo of the Italian fashion industry. Dolce & Gabbana, Ferré, Krizia, Moschino, Prada, Armani, and Versace have all catapulted to international stardom from design studios based here. Milan is all about worldly pleasures. Shopping is of almost religious significance. Theatre and cinema flourish in this fashionable milieu, as does a hopping club scene and a slew of tempting restaurants.

Day 7: Milan

Day at leisure in Milan.

Day 8: Milan

Breakfast. Today you will transfer to the airport with sufficient time to return your rental car and check in for your flight back home.

Airport drop off: MXP (Milan Malpensa Airport)

Flight details:

MXP 21:40 DUB 23:10