1. The food is great. A lot of it is stunningly great. We had very few meals that we didn’t enjoy. A lot.
2. The Paris Metro is surprisingly easy to navigate. Even for a couple of midwesterners who can get a little stressed with Chicago traffic. Really.
3. Dinner reservations are important. Throughout our trip it was very nice to know where we were having dinner each night. We can wing it for breakfast and lunch, but dinner needs to be planned in advance in our opinion.
4. There are many cobbled streets and sidewalks so it’s important to wear good sturdy shoes and watch where you are walking. Everywhere.
5. Ice is not a thing here. If it’s not a required ingredient, it won’t be in your drink. This is everywhere we have been.
6. Greeting are important. A simple “bonjour” or “buongiorno” goes a long way and when you try to speak their language they often very quickly speak English. I’m guessing our horrible accents hurt their ears.
7. There are a lot of parks. They are beautiful and make nice spots to relax on a bench in the shade.
8. Get a Paris Museum Pass. We found it to be worth its weight in gold. We were able to skip hours and hours worth of lines.
9. If you don’t have a museum pass (Paris Museum Pass, FirenzeCard, etc) buy skip the line passes for big sights. We stood outside St. Mark’s in Venice and bought a skip the line pass online for about 8 euros that allowed us to enter without waiting in the long line.
9. Be prepared for a lot of walking. Our max day was over 19,000 steps and there wasn’t a day under 10,000.
10. Anti Monkey Butt powder can be a life saver. A lot of walking means a lot of sweating in certain areas. Enough said.
11. Prepare to get lost. Embrace it. Don’t panic. Don’t get testy. It will happen so just go with it.
12. Venice smells like the ocean. We’ve heard people say it stinks. Maybe those people have not spent a lot of time around the sea. That said, we may have had a whiff of urine in a few dark alleys.
13. Venice vaporetto routes are reduced after 10 pm so plan your evening accordingly.
14. Eat all the seafood in Venice. It was so fresh!
15. Take a water taxi somewhere in Venice. It’s expensive (although much less than a gondola) but feels great to have the boat all to yourselves (other than the driver of course).
16. Get a time limited vaporetto card in Venice. For 15 or 30 Euros each (we can’t remember which) you have unlimited vaporetto rides for 48 hours. You can customize the hours to your time in Venice.
17. Several places that require reservations do not pay attention to your reservation time and will allow you to enter early (Accademia and Uffizi in Florence, Vatican in Rome). The skip the line for the Colosseum in Rome (I believe it was purchased through coopculture.it), pays attention to the time. We attempted to enter early but were turned away and asked to return at our scheduled time. It makes sense, the time is the time. We saw this happen to multiple people, so they are consistent.
18. Airpods. These were wonderful. With an Airpod in one ear you can walk down the street listening to your phone map give you walking directions. They free up your hands from always carrying your phone as you find your way around. We also used them to listen to downloads on the Rick Steves’ app. He led us around multiple museums throughout the trip, giving detailed descriptions and insights.
