Italy and Spain Tour for Families

There can be two sides to a family vacation in Rome. You can explore the sights, and then you can simply wander around, watching the world go while experiencing the old-world atmosphere. Today you will visit the Vatican City to hear the stories on St. Peter’s Square, and then climb the circling steps of the Cupola. If you are interested, your tour can continue into the Vatican Museums, usually crowded, but also incredibly beautiful with your guide who knows exactly where to go. The Sistine Chapel may be the place of ultimate fame, but there are dozens of rooms packed with art that few outside Italy appreciate. After a late lunch on a piazza, the afternoon is left free so that you can keep exploring and relaxing on the cafe terraces. Campo de’ Fiori, Piazza Navona, the Trevi Fountain are all nearby, and there are so many fascinating places and neighborhoods to discover.

Move next to Ancient Rome, and the stories come alive in all their gore and glory. Discover the Colosseum and Roman Forum with your local guide and make sense of fact and fiction as you breathe in the grandeur of centuries past. Legends of yesteryear continue this afternoon in Gladiator School, where the swords are fake but everything else seems to be from the time of Maximus Aurelius. For a fun evening in the heart of Rome, go to the Spanish Steps and join local families in their nightly passeggiata – a slow walk on pedestrianized streets. Countless restaurants can be found in the vicinity and you can dine outside as church bells chime through the evening.

Cobblestone streets might jangle the bones a little, but it is great fun to ride a pedicab through Trastevere, an old neighborhood that is less about sightseeing and more about what you might find down the many passageways. Marvel at the facades of Santa Maria Church, admire 12th-century gold mosaics and get a feel for an area very different from the others you have seen in Rome. Later in the afternoon, you will board the high-speed train to Florence and meet your guide at the station to receive your rental car. It is only 80 minutes between the two cities and the views are sublime, Rome giving way to rolling green hills before you whizz into a city of spires. Your villa is 30 minutes south of the Renaissance capital, in the Chianti region.

Serenity reigns in the Chianti Hills and at first, there is no sound at all, but then you hear the kids rattling around or the espresso machine kicking out steam. Look out from your villa, and mostly you will see vineyards, along with a village that from a distance appears to be crumbling. Take your breakfast on the terrace beside the pool and take your time as you watch your kids jump into the pool and use up their energy. There is space and freedom to be together as a family here, with hardly anyone else around but incredible vistas everywhere you look. Your villa is serviced, and daily breakfast is provided, with the pool and terrace being private.

You could easily spend all day at the villa, and perhaps anywhere else in the world you would do that. But with this being Tuscany, there are so many places to experience within just an hour’s drive. You could head back to Florence and spend a day in the city, soaking up the art and architecture and wondering about Michelangelo’s David. You could also go wine tasting at one of the Chianti vineyards, the subtle white wines complemented by fine Italian food and views over the grapes. At check-in, you will receive a book of information that is full of ideas of where to go, where to dine, and what to do over these three days.

Go for lunch in San Gimignano, admire the fabulous old piazza in Siena, or spend half a day in Pisa, taking those iconic family photos with the tower. Visit some of the crumbling hilltop villages to find places that show the beauty of authentic Italian cuisine. In Italy, great food is not just found in grand restaurants, as it is more often found in small family cafes as well. Three days is a good amount of time to take things slow and still explore plenty of Tuscany. Of course, you cannot experience it all, but you can pick and choose and see what most excites your family’s imagination.

It will be an early start as you drop the car at Florence Airport and fly across the Mediterranean to Barcelona, a city of Catalonian pride. Barcelona is the best big city in Spain for kids, full of interesting and diverse things to do while being easy on the eye and framed by gorgeous beaches. Your guide will meet you at the airport and escort you to your hotel in Barrio Gothic, a central location from which to walk to the beach or walk around old Barcelona. In staying here, you will not need a car, but you can easily reach outlying places on the Metro. Spend an hour or two in your neighborhood, listening to 1,500-year-old tales before coming out at the Columbus statue and waterfront. The afternoon is at your leisure, with more than enough around you to explore.

Dive into the magic of Barcelona, and you will find Gaudi, the Modernista who designed architecture with the freedom of a child’s imagination with ghoulish swirls, animal mosaics, flowing lines, and tree trunks that became bridges. Gaudi’s art is one of Barcelona’s premier attractions, and you will visit three of his icons today, first beating the crowds at La Sagrada Familia, before Casa Batllo and a tapas lunch in a local neighborhood. For the afternoon, you have many choices as you can check out figures at the Wax Museum, get your hands sticky in a chocolate workshop, or take a drink in the ice bar. None of it is very Catalan, but it is all highly entertaining. Be sure to take the escalators to a final Gaudi masterpiece and explore Park Guell at your own leisure, a perfect spot to watch the sunset.

Your day is left free so you that you can experience the parts of Barcelona that your family is most interested in. You might opt for Camp Nou, home to FC Barcelona and players like Messi or you could explore the works of Picasso in his museum near your hotel. Perhaps check out the European Museum of Modern Art or Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, or you might spend your afternoon on the beach or with a train ride to the monastery at Poblet. There are magnificent parks and mountaintops, or you could spend your day in Sitges or Tarragona down the coast. When you are staying in Barrio Gothic, it is an almost impossible choice over what and where to eat, including rich Catalan dishes, Valencian paella, and Andalusian tapas, as Barcelona is multicultural in its dining.

Your short afternoon flight brings you from Catalonia to Basque, combining two regions that have fought heavily for independence. Spain is many countries within one, and landing in San Sebastian, you will quickly notice the contrasts. Even the language is different, although any Spanish the kids have picked up will be joyfully received by locals, even if the street signs are in Basque. Pick up your rental car at the airport, and it is only a 15-minute drive to your hotel where there is secure underground parking beneath your glamorous five-story townhouse. San Sebastian has been an upmarket getaway town since the late 19th century, and on this first afternoon and evening, you will quickly see why. Your vehicle is not required when in San Sebastian, as it is a small city that is quicker and easier to get around on foot.

Look out from the fourth-floor window to find a golden sandy beach curving beneath you. To the right, you will see the old city overflowing with late medieval treasures and cobbled streets. To the left, you will see only nature as the city quickly gives way to a Basque coastline back-dropped by low-slung mountains. Behind and around you are San Sebastian’s broad boulevards, streets of artistic townhouses with a cafe or restaurant on every corner. This is a town that enchanted early holiday-makers in the late 19thcentury, and it has not lost its charm since. And while many choose to head to southern Spain for a beach vacation, those with a little more suave and style find their place in San Sebastian.

The beach here is brilliant for kids as there is a lot of space, the water is warm and shallow and the natural bay brings calm waters that are more like a swimming pool than a sea. Just across the road from your hotel, and you will be on the sand. You could also take a walk along the promenade, something everyone who visits San Sebastian should do at sunset. This is one of Europe’s best city beach breaks, and while the beach is superb, the city continues to provide local flavors. San Sebastian has not become a monotone tourist destination, catering to everyone’s tastes. Walk around and see that it remains proudly Basque, from the architecture and cafes to culinary delicacies and the promotion of local styles.

As in Tuscany, you could spend three days not using the rental car. But the other advantage of San Sebastian is its location. Within an hour of driving north, you can be in La Rioja, Spain’s most famous wine region, where the old towns are built upon cellars, and the atmosphere is distinctively local. Travel west and you are quickly in Bilbao, a city of the very old, the old and the future with an early medieval core, languid 19th-century streets, and then futuristic architecture personified by the Guggenheim.

You could also drive east and along the coast towards French Basque, stopping at quiet fishing villages, or even heading up into mountains dotted with early Christian villages. Pamplona is another option, a city that has much more than its famous bull-running city. Like its surroundings, Pamplona is a place of castles, cobbled streets, vast pedestrianized areas and so many stories from old Spain. All of these places have an authentic local atmosphere, and none of them have been altered much by tourism. You may even have to use your Spanish to get by, which is part of the fun. Return to San Sebastian, and you are in one of Europe’s ultimate culinary hotspots, where the food can be fine – Basque has more entrants in the World Top 50 Restaurants list than any other region – or laid-back and experimental by going pincho-hopping through the streets.

Drop your vehicle back at Donostia Airport to begin your homebound journey. Your two weeks in Italy and Spain will have flown quickly past, but there has been plenty of time to rest and reset as well as experience the sights together as a family.