Venezia, Firenze, Roma!
8 DAYS
Venice Lido 2 • Florence 2 • Rome 2
Basic Inclusions
Accommodations
Accommodations in centrally-located three-star or four-star hotels. Rooming on a triple basis. Double rooms: $50 per night, per person.
Meals
All breakfasts. All dinners. Dinner with entertainment at Le Terme del Colosseo on Day 7.
Transportation
Round-trip transportation on scheduled airline. All public transportation tickets included where applicable.
Guide
Services of a specially-trained passports Tour Director throughout. All tips are included in the Program Cost. Whisper headsets included.
Travel Protection
Passports provides and pays for a Post Departure Travel Protection Plan that includes coverage for Trip Interruption, Trip Delay, Medical Expense and Evacuation and more.
Tour Summary
Itinerary Includes
Unlimited public transportation
Days 1-2: Arrival Venice Lido
Boatbus to/from the airport
Day 3: Venice - Venice Lido
Venice Guided Walking Tour: Round-trip water bus to St. Mark's Square, Local Guide, Glassblowing demonstration, Grand Canal boat ride
Day 4: Venice - Florence
Boatbus, High-speed train Venice-Florence, Arrival transfer
Guided walking tour in Florence: Local guide, Visit to the Accademia, Visit to the nave of Florence's Duomo (time permitting), Visit to the church of Santa Croce and its Pazzi Chapel, Stop at Leonardo's Leather Workshop (time permitting)
Day 5: Florence
Excursion to Pisa: Photo stop at the Leaning Tower of Pisa, Visit to Pisa's Duomo
Day 6: Florence - Rome
Departure transfer, High-speed train Florence-Rome, Arrival transfer
Visits to the Colosseum and the Roman Forum: 24-hour public transportation pass in Rome, Local guide, Headset receiver
Visit to the Pantheon
Stroll on Piazza Navona
Day 7: Rome
Visit to the Vatican Museums: Local guide, Headset receiver for the Vatican sites, Visit to the Sistine Chapel, Visit to St. Peter's Basilica, 24-hour public transportation pass in Rome
Dinner with entertainment at Le Terme del Colosseo
Day 8: Departure
Departure transfer
UNPARALLELED STANDARD OF EXCELLENCE
CITY-CENTER HOTELS
Stay right in the heart of it. Why settle for staying outside of the city? Wake up in the city. Explore. Have dinner in the city. Explore. Return to the hotel at your convenience.
Check out our typical hotels
3-AND-4 STAR HOTELS
We’ve scoured each city for the finest hotels for our groups. Comfortable, conveniently located, clean and safe. That’s what we do.
HOTEL CHOICE
We give you options - but the choice is yours.
AMAZING FOOD
Student tour dinners don’t have to stink! Enjoy authentic, high-quality food, and lots of it. Three-course meals that you will want to post on social media.
Check out what our food is like
INDUSTRY BEST TOUR DIRECTORS
Passports contracts only the finest, A+ Tour Directors in the industry. With decades of experience, our team is second-to-none in terms of experience and professionalism. Read more about our amazing Tour Directors.
24-HOUR SERVICE
Your Tour Director will meet you at the airport and stay with you every step of the way until your return flight. They are your own personal travel expert.
INCLUDED FLIGHTS
We work with the airlines so you don’t have to.
BEST AVAILABLE ROUTINGS
We look for the best possible routings for your group with a minimal number of legs and ideal layovers. We try to get you in early - but not too early - to maximize your time overseas.
MORE INCLUSIONS
UNLIMITED PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION INCLUDED
You don’t want to have to worry about getting metro tickets when you’re pressed for time. We provide pre-loaded travel cards so that you can hit the ground running.
INCLUDED OVERSEAS MEDICAL COVERAGE
Passports provides and pays for a post-departure travel protection plan that helps protect you while on your trip with coverage for trip interruption, trip delay, baggage loss, theft or delay, emergency medical expenses, evacuation and more.
ALL TIPS INCLUDED OPTION
Tour Directors receive tips at the end of the tour. Including the tip in the up-front tour cost saves your group from carrying around extra money overseas or being surprised with an extra expense at the end of the tour. This is just another way that Passports is honest and up-front about all expenses. You can choose to include the tip ahead of time - or not to. Passports gives you the option.
NO ON TOUR UPSELL
Ever been pressured on tour to purchase an excursion? Or been shuttled into one workshop after another? Not with Passports.
VALUE VALUE VALUE
Dollar-for-dollar Passports is the best value you can get. Our tours are packed with included activities for a price that you can't beat with any other company.
HUMAN-FIRST POLICIES
FANATICAL CUSTOMER SUPPORT
We are here to be your partner. We support our group leaders 100%. Through thick and thin, we will work with you to make your travel program an annual success.
BEST REFUND POLICY IN THE INDUSTRY
Passports refunds 75% until 30 days prior to departure as our default policy. Early cancellations have fixed, low cancellation penalties. We would love for you to compare our cancellation policy to our competitors. Passports acts as the best partner we can, for every traveler, on every tour. That’s our promise.
SINGLE POINT OF CONTACT
Our Tour Advisors are amazing people who work with the group leaders during the pre-sale, enrollment, pre-departure, on-tour and post-tour periods. They check in when the group is overseas. They are the point of contact throughout the entire process to assist in all phases of the tour. This is more important than you would think unless you’ve been with another company and changed hands several times in the course of the tour. The point is: trust and accountability are critical in our relationship with a group leader.
NO HIDDEN CHARGES
No adult fee. With Passports, adults pay the same as students. Oftentimes adults will opt for a double room as they can’t room with students, and there is a charge for the double room. But there is no charge simply for being an adult.
No hidden airline fees. No hidden tripwire fees. With Passports, what you see is what you get.
But, what’s it really like?
Detailed Itinerary
Days 1-2: Arrival
A dream comes true as your wide-bodied jet thunders off the airstrip, Europe-bound. Time for a meal, a movie and a nap. Then it gets light again, first off the left-hand side of the airplane, then everywhere. It's morning, and Italy!
Relax or start exploring the "Pearl of the Adriatic." Remember Marco Polo, who set out from this magnificent harbor in 1271, at the age of 18, on a fantastic journey to Asia.
Overnight: Venice Lido
Day 3: Venice Guided Walking Tour
After a water bus ride to the greatest square in the West, Piazza San Marco, enjoy a walking tour led by a local guide. You will see the Doges' Palace and St. Mark's Basilica.
Head to the Rialto area to visit the nooks and crannies of Old Venice and the lively Rialto Market.
A half-day local guide, well-educated and specially-trained on the history and culture of Venice, will accompany your group.
Visit a glass workshop, where a skilled glassblower will demonstrate the techniques and artistic sense required to produce the world-renowned Venetian glass.
Enjoy a water bus ride along the Canal Grande. You will pass by elegant palazzi built between the 13th and 18th centuries, and travel under the Rialto Bridge, which was once the only link between the two sides of the city's major waterway.
The afternoon is unscheduled.
Make plans with your tour director.
If the weather is favorable, you may want to arrange a gondola ride along the canals, past stately palaces. This is a uniquely Venetian experience, as extravagant and as unforgettable as the city itself.
Overnight: Venice Lido
Day 4: Train to Florence, Florence Guided Walking Tour
A water bus will take you to the train station.
Say arrivederci to Venice as you board a high-speed train that will take you across the rolling hills of Italy's hinterland to splendid Firenze, the "Jewel of the Renaissance."
Get acquainted with the Medici family and the art of politics!
A local guide, well-educated and specially-trained on the history and culture of Florence, will accompany your group.
View a wealth of artwork from the 15th and 16th centuries at the Galleria dell'Accademia, including the best known of all Florentine treasures, Michelangelo's monumental David.
In the nave of the Cattedrale Santa Maria del Fiore, better known as the Duomo, visitors marvel at a cathedral begun in 1296 and consecrated in 1436 that remains one of the largest in Christendom. It houses precious masterpieces, notably Domenico di Michelino's 1320 painting titled Dante holding the Divine Comedy.
Next on your program: the church that's the final resting place of luminaries such as Michelangelo, Machiavelli, and Galileo. Santa Croce is also famous for its art treasures, notably the Cappella dei Pazzi, a chapel attributed to Brunelleschi that's hailed as a masterpiece of Renaissance architecture.
Watch a craftsman demonstrate steps used in the manufacture of the world-renowned Florentine leather goods.
Overnight: Florence
Day 5: Excursion to Pisa, Florence
An excursion takes you to Pisa, the city whose navy once dominated the Western Mediterranean, before the Arno River silted up.
Just north of the city center, discover the Campo dei Miracoli and its trio of remarkable Moorish-style religious buildings. The most famous of the three is the Leaning Tower, now tilting nearly 13 feet from its vertical axis. Hear about the various solutions proposed to counteract the sinking of its foundation.
Enter the sumptuous Romanesque Duomo, a 900-year-old sanctuary consecrated in 1118 that remained Europe's largest cathedral for nearly 100 years. Inside, art treasures include notably 14th-century mosaics, the 17th-century wooden ceiling decorated with gold leaf, and Giovanni Pisano's outstanding 13th-century marble pulpit.
The remainder of the day is free to plan as you wish.
You may want to check out Florence's leather and jewelry shops, or the boutiques where you can acquire beautiful reproductions of Florentine artwork at reasonable prices.
Overnight: Florence
Day 6: Train to Rome, Colosseum and Roman Forum, Pantheon, Piazza Navona
Enjoy a scenic ride aboard a fast train headed to the Eternal City.
Proceed to your centrally-located hotel, settle in and get ready to explore your surroundings.
Walk through the best known monuments of Ancient Rome, the Colosseo and the Foro Romano. Once the heart of a vast empire, the Forum was filled with extravagant buildings and crowded with people from all over the known world.
A local guide, specially-trained on the history and culture of Rome and its surroundings, will accompany your group.
A headset receiver is included.
Your combination ticket to the Colosseum and Roman Forum also allows entrance to the Palatine Hill archaeological site and its museum: should time permits, you may want to make your way up the hill to visit the oldest and most prestigious residential area of Ancient Rome.
Inside the "Temple to All the Gods," you will understand why it has been called one of the better-preserved and most harmonious monuments of antiquity.
Walk through the plaza built on the site of Domitian's Stadium. Lined with grand buildings and trendy cafes, this oblong square is adorned with statues and fountains, notably Bernini's Fountain of the Four Rivers.
Overnight: Rome
Day 7: Vatican Museums, Le Terme del Colosseo Dinner with Music, Rome
Discover outstanding masterpieces collected for the Vatican Museums since the early 1500s. See exceptional statues from antiquity, such as Laocoön and His Son and the Apollo Belvedere, as well as stunning Renaissance paintings, notably the The School of Athens fresco in the Raphael Rooms.
A half-day local guide, well-educated and specially-trained on the history and culture of Vatican City, will accompany your group.
Marvel at Michelangelo's Last Judgment and brightly-colored ceiling frescoes in the Cappella Sistina.
Enter the sanctuary recognized as the world's largest church. The Basilica di San Pietro also houses priceless works of art, in particular Michelangelo's Pietà and Bernini's Dove of the Holy Spirit.
Tonight, enjoy dinner with entertainment at the restaurant Le Terme del Colosseo, which is located between the Colosseum and the Roman Forum, in halls with arched ceilings and exposed stone. It offers a variety of Italian dishes accompanied by musical entertainment titled "Roman Fantasy," with singers in costume.
You may have already seen Piazza Navona, the Spanish Steps, Via Veneto, and the Trevi Fountain. Return to Piazza di Trevi with a coin: throw it over your right shoulder and into the spray to ensure your return to this wonderful city!
Overnight: Rome
Day 8: Departure
Ciao, Europa! Statistics show that visitors do in fact return to Rome, although it may not have anything to do with coins in a fountain. Race the sun and arrive home later today, eager to share your discoveries with family and friends.
CUSTOM TOURS
All tours can be customized to your particular needs.
Or start from scratch - we will build your dream tour!
Venice
Venice Glass Blowing
Florence
Pisa
Colosseum, Rome
The Vatican
A deep dive into how travel opens students’ minds not just to cultures, but to future career paths in fields like global studies, archaeology, art history, and even diplomacy.