Italy was one of our favourite European countries for backpacking, despite its reputation as an expensive travel destination. The street food was fantastic, the cost of hostel accommodation is comparatively low, and there is a great balance of big cities, small towns, and beautiful nature.
We visited Italy at the very end of the high season, from the end of August to the middle of September. It was still very hot, and while the crowds were (apparently) smaller than mid-June, it still felt very busy.
Our average daily spend (excluding inter-city transport) was 213NZD / €136 for two people. This made Italy one of the cheapest countries we visited in all of Europe. We stayed in dorms on two occasions, but all other nights were spent in a private room. We didn’t struggle to find cheap food, with a great lunch for two costing 10-15€, and 30€ got us a delicious dinner with half a litre of house wine. A coffee and a cornetti (pastry) will set you back all of 3€. That being said, we did have quite a few ‘supermarket lunches’ – often we didn’t need, or want to pay for, a full meal. Italy’s supermarkets are cheap, and the quality of the produce is amazing.
During all our time in Europe, we travelled exclusively by train, using the Eurail pass (which is functionally the same as the Interail pass). We had two months of continuous, unlimited travel on national and regional trains. For our itinerary, which totalled over 45 train rides, the Eurail pass was worth the rather large price tag, but it’s not right for everyone. Alternatively, the Europe-wide Fixbus system is extremely budget-friendly, and has connections to nearly every town and city.
The biggest cost in Italy are the famous museums and historical attractions. Tickets average between 12-25€ per person (for a standard ticket – expect to pay more than double for a ‘skip-the-line’, and triple for a guided tour.) Our key to getting the most from these places without breaking the bank was the Rick Steves Audio Europe app. I cannot recommend this enough. The app is completely free and contains audio-tours of all the major attractions in Europe. Rick and his co-host Lyssa, will walk and talk you through all you need to know, from the Colosseum to the Sistine Chapel. The tours range from 30mins-2hrs, and you can just plug in headphones and play them off your phone. It’s a truly generous and incredible resource.
Rome: 3 Nights
(We actually stayed in Rome for 4 nights, if you count the night we arrived at 4am).
We’d heard mixed reviews about Rome before we got there. Some people said it was crowded, dirty, unpleasant. Other people told us it was beautiful, clean, and easy to walk around. And honestly, we have to agree with the latter. Of course Rome suffers from the same problems that plague many big cities (dog piss smell, big cars in narrow streets, litter) but we found the whole city to be really charming.
Because it was my birthday, my mother had booked us an incredible apartment in the Navona district (thanks mum!). But nearby Traverstere had some great hostel (and cheap food!) options, and is within a reasonable walking distance to the main attractions. We spent one extra night in a private-room/share bathroom AirBnB in San Giovanni, which set us back 62NZD / €36 – and it was an easy metro ride from the centre.
The two big paid attractions in Rome are the Colosseum (and neighbouring Roman Forum), and the Vatican Museum (which also houses the Sistine Chapel and is connected to St Peter’s Basilica).
Both of these sites are so historically significant that it would be criminal to miss either of them – however, they’re both crowded and full of tour groups, at any time of day. The Rick Steves Audio Europe app has a tour of the Colosseum that lasts about forty minutes, a two-hour tour of the Vatican Artworks, a twenty-minute tour of the Sistine Chapel, and a twenty-minute tour of St Peter’s Basilica (which includes a bit of info on St Peter’s Square). They were all fantastic – the Colosseum is especially hard to appreciate without hearing the history through your headphones.
Entry to the Colosseum will set you back 20NZD / €12 (the same ticket can be used for the Roman Forum, and vice versa), and a ticket to the Vatican Museum will be €17+4 for online booking (which includes the Sistine Chapel, and St Peter’s Basilica is free to enter – just remember to cover shoulders and knees.) Before we came to Italy, we’d heard that you simply HAVE to buy skip-the-line tickets, otherwise you’ll be in line for roughly a MILLION HOURS and you’ll probably perish before you get within two kilometers of the ticket booth. It’s not true.
We believed the hype and bought expensive skip-the-line tickets for the Colosseum (from GetYourGuide, they were sold out on the official website), which got us in at 8.45am. And at that time, the line to buy tickets was about 30mins long – honestly, we would have been fine to wait and save a couple of dollars.
For the Vatican City, we managed to get tickets for 3pm from the official website – and when we got there, there was NO LINE to buy tickets. People were walking straight in. The internet had lied to us.
So we started to employ the 3pm rule throughout all museums in Europe, and we never had to wait longer than 30mins. Don’t try to ‘get there early’ – mornings are when the lines are longest. Have a good breakfast, a nice lunch, and get there late to miss the queue.
Outside of the famous attractions though, there was plenty to explore in Rome. Rick Steves has two fantastic walking tours, one through Trastevere (so much food for under 15€/pp) and central Rome – where you stroll past the Pantheon, the Trevi Fountain, and the Spanish Steps. We visited the Trevi fountain twice – once at 7am (thanks Jetlag!) and once at 7pm. You probably don’t need me to tell you that 7am was peaceful, with only a few other tourists… and 7pm was like being in the line for Splash Mountain at Disneyland.
Notable Cheap Eats in Rome:
- Grazia & Graziella – Super trendy with a really reasonably priced menu. Get in before 7pm to avoid the queue. The gnocchi with clams was one of our favourite meals in Europe. 35€ for two mains and two drinks.
- La Tavernetta 29 – For super tasty classics at a reasonable price. Gets a bit of a queue later in the evening, but there are lots of tables. The portions are huge, the house wine is cheap. We shared one starter, and a pasta main, and we were full. Add house wine and it’s still only ~25€.
- Roscioli coffee shop and bakery – Two separate establishments, both great. The coffee at Roscioli was the best we had in Italy (you have to drink at the bar, but they were very accommodating of our awkward tourist ways). The bakery is (apparently) the best in Central Rome, with everything from sweets to pizza-by-weight to the most addictive arancini balls we’ve ever had.
Siena, 2 nights
Siena is a really lovely town in Tuscany, situated between Italy and Florence. It has a really cool history, a well-preserved historical centre, and frequent parades (complete with traditional dress, huge waving flags, and lots of drumming.)
We stayed in a private-room/share bathroom AirBnB inside the historical centre for 62NZD / €32 per night (no kitchen access, which we found out the hard way!) It only takes about thirty minutes to walk from one side of the historical centre to the other, so everywhere is within walking distance. There’s lots of charming streets and shops, as well as a gigantic central piazza which is great for people watching.
Every year this central piazza transforms into a horse-racing track – a tradition which started back in 1633. There are 17 extremely proud, rival neighbourhood communities (‘contrada’) that make up Siena, and each year, they battle it out in two horse races (one in July and one in August). When we were there, at the end of August, we’d missed the last race but we got to see the winner’s parade around the piazza, with huge floats, lots of drums, lots of wine – and at the end, the winning horse (who hailed from the Contrada della Selva).
Rick Steves Audio Europe provides a walking tour of Siena that gives great context to the history and rivalry between the contrada. When we were done listening, it was just nice to sit in the piazza with a gelato and watch people enjoying the end-of-summer weather.
Notable Cheap Eats in Sienna:
- Osteria Del Gatto – This place was right beside our Airbnb, and it was delicious. The menu was hand-written daily, exclusively in Italian. Make sure you’ve got Google Translate downloaded offline. Luckily for us, another diner (who could speak English) helped us choose what to order. Two starters and a pasta main, plus a half-litre of house wine, 30€.
- Osteria Nonna Gina. Italian-only menu, but servers can speak enough English to help you order. The antipasti board was gigantic. Add a pasta, and some house wine, and it was a fantastic meal for 30€.
- Bar Pasticceria Nannini – Not exactly a cheap eat, but an institution in Sienna. So many incredible desserts, including a huge variety of panforte – which originated in Sienna.
Florence, 2 nights
Florence is a beautiful big city, with the river Arno running right through the middle. Lovers of food and wine could spend much longer here than we did. Unfortunately for backpackers like us, charming Florence is much generally pricier than Rome. We felt two nights was enough time for us to visit the Uffizi Gallery, the Bargello Museum, explore the other side of the river, and have a few excellent meals.
We stayed in a private room/share bathroom AirBnB for 80NZD / €47 per night, an easy 15mins walk from the centre of town.
The Uffizi Gallery is a truly incredible art gallery, and shouldn’t be missed. Rick Steves has a fantastic art history tour of the key pieces (Updated August 2019). Entry to the gallery is 30ND / 18€pp (14€ if you line up). We purchased tickets online the day before, through the official site. You only have a 15min window to enter the museum (according to the time on your ticket), and the place is full of tour groups, but we still spent a happy two hours walking around.
The other significant art attraction in Florence is the famous statue of David. So famous, in fact, that the original sculpture practically has his own museum (the Galleria dell’Accademia – with tickets costing an extortionate 27NZD / 16€pp – considering the statue of David is the primary piece in this entire gallery). However, the original hasn’t always been displayed in a gallery. For years, he stood at the entrance to the Palazzo Vecchio, where a replica David now stands. So we saved a few Euros, and listened to the Rick Steves ‘Statue of David’ audio tour… while looking at the replica in the piazza.
On the other hand, the Bargello sculpture gallery was only 10NZD / 6€pp. Despite its central location and numerous Michelangelo pieces, it was very quiet when we were there. Rick Steves has a tour of the collection, and when you’re done, the courtyard is very nice to sit in.
We didn’t visit the Palazzo Pitti or Giardino di Boboli galleries. If you do want to visit these galleries, you can buy a combined ticket, which also includes the Uffizi and Bargello museums.
We didn’t line up to enter the Duomo, because the line was long, and the internet had informed us it much better to look at from the outside anyway.
Tickets and queues aside, Florence was very pleasant to explore. We did a Rick Steves walking tour of the historical centre, which finished on the Ponte Vecchio. From there, it was a lovely walk up to the Piazzale Michelangelo, which affords an incredible view back over the city. The entire square was full of good buskers, young people with takeaway pizzas, and vendors selling beer and wine. A lovely place to watch the sunset.
Notable Cheap Eats in Florence:
(We found Google Maps opening hours notoriously bad in Florence. We walked to so many padlocked doors that were listed as open. It became very frustrating.)
- Trattoria Sabatino (our best meal in Italy) – I still dream about this meal. This tiny, family run place was made famous by Anthony Bourdain, but it’s far enough from the tourist centre that you don’t need a reservation. We had three courses, including meat, fruit, pasta, stuffed chicken, and ricotta cake, as well as a litre of house wine, for 60NZD / 35€. Handwritten menu, all in Italian. Some servers seemed to know a few key English words, but we used Google Translate.
- I Fratellini – Two huge sandwiches and a glass of wine for 17NZD / 10€. Always a line, nowhere to sit, you have to squat on the curb and sip your vino. But it’s part of the fun!
Cinque Terre, 3 nights
The beautiful region of Cinque Terre is made up of five small coastal towns, each perched on the edge of a cliff, overlooking the sea. There are numerous hiking trails to take you from town to town (as well as a regional train) and plenty of swimming spots. This area has always been very popular, but Instagram has made it extra-famous, and you’ll find no budget accommodation in any of the five towns.
There is one excellent hostel, Ostello Tramonti, which is situated in the inland town of Biassa. The hostel runs daily shuttles to the largest of the seaside towns, Riomaggiore, and these are free if you stay more than three nights. Alternatively, Ostello Tramonti is a one hour walk from Riomaggiore. Two beds in a 4-bed/shared bathroom dorm cost us 85NZD / €50. The hostel is huge and clean, with a fantastic (and reasonably priced) onsite restaurant. The staff were very helpful, with detailed knowledge of all the hiking trails. The town of Biassa is very small, but still has a couple of small shops for groceries, and a pizzeria with 8€ pies.
We spent three nights here, which gave us enough time to explore the five towns on foot and do a few hikes. The towns themselves are incredibly busy (we visited at the end of high season, in mid-September) but there’s not much to do in them anyway – just more of the same mid-tier expensive restaurants and souvenir shops. We were advised by our hostel to catch the train all the way to the 5th town, Monterosso and walk back on the paid coastal trail that links the towns together.
There is the possibility to buy a ‘Cinque Terre Card’ for 27NZD / 16€pp. This card gives you entrance to all paid coastal trails, as well as unlimited train rides over a 24h period. We didn’t buy this, as the regional train was included in our ‘2m Global Eurail pass’ but other people in our hostel found it good value.
The coastal walk (which costs 13NZD / €7.5pp, or is included in the Cinque Terre Card) gives you the best views of each town. It takes about an hour to walk between each town (with the route being a predictable up – flat – down.) We walked from town 5 (Monterosso) to town 4 (Vernazza) and finished up at town 3 (Corniglia). We made the mistake of getting hungry at expensive Vernazza (town 4.) If you can, try to hold on and have lunch at Corniglia (town 3.) Perhaps due to the fact that it doesn’t have direct beach access, and consequently has the least number of tourists, Corniglia has a much more chilled out vibe. You’ll find slightly cheaper eateries here, as well as a fantastic swimming spot that’s tucked among the rocks, down a set of steep stairs. We got here at the end of the day, and immediately wished we’d got here earlier.
By the time we’d stopped in each town for a gelato and a swim, it took us most of the day to walk from Monterosso (town 5) to Corniglia (town 3), so we caught the train back to Riomaggiore (town 1). If you are a speed walker though, the coastal trail is replaced by an inland (free to walk) trail which links towns 3, 2 and 1.
On our second day, we hiked from Biassa (where the hostel is) to Porto Venere, a three-hour downhill walk which was almost completely empty of other tourists. The hostel staff helpfully explained the route, and we found it fairly easy to follow on Maps.me – another girl from our hostel did get lost though, and her three-hour walk turned into a six-hour hike! Once in Porto Venere, there are lots of places to grab some pesto focaccia for lunch for less than 10€.
To get back to the hostel, we took the bus from Porto Venere to La Spezia, and then the train to Riomaggiore, where we met up with the hostel shuttle. We could have taken the ferry from Porto Vente to Riomaggiore, but it was 27NZD / €16pp. Lol no.
Notable cheap eats in Cinque Terre:
- Dai Treggi pizzeria (Biassa town) – Big, tasty cheap pizzas around the corner from the hostel. Most pizzas under 10euro.
- Tutti Fritti (Riomaggiore) – Cones of delicious fried seafood. The big one is enough for two people to share for lunch. Our eyes were bigger than our stomachs and we got two – and it was wayyy too much.
- Ostello Tramonti – I’m putting the hostel in here because the food was really good. A lot of people just ate here every night. The chef used to own his own restaurant, the coffee in the morning was great, and all the prices were extremely fair.
Bologna, 1 night
The university city of Bologna makes for a fantastic stop between Cinque Terre/Florence and Venice. It was one of the only places we visited in Italy that didn’t feel distorted by tourism. The huge University of Bologna occupies a large portion of the historical centre, and there’s plenty of bars and some great cheap eats.
We stayed in a private room/share bathroom AirBnB for 72NZD / €42. One of our more eccentric (crazy??) Airbnb hosts, but we had only decided to come to Bologna the night before, and our accommodation options were limited. If you can, try to get a bed at Dopa Hostel, which was well-reviewed by other travellers we met.
One afternoon is all you really need for Bologna’s historical centre. The whole town used to be covered in ‘i-can-build-a-taller-tower-than-you’ brick structures, but now only one tower remains – leaning perilously in the town square. There are a few good gelato shops right at its base. In the evening, there’s a few side streets lined with bars and covered in street art. Finally, three completely different people had recommended the following restaurant to us – another fantastic, family-run cheap eat. The tortellini in the broth was particularly good, and there’s no way we could go to Bologna without having some ragu, right?
Notable cheap eats in Bologna:
- Osteria dell’Orsa – recommended to us by everyone, and definitely worth it. A mixed crostini starter, tagliatelle ragu and tortellini in broth, as well as some wine, set us back 61ND / €36. It was all delicious.
Venice, 3 nights
Venice was a mixed bag. The floating neighbourhood really does have to be seen to be believed – the architecture is beautiful, the canals sparkle, and the gondolas turn every corner into a postcard. BUT it’s hard not to compare it to Disneyland. It’s completely swarmed with the worst kind of tourists, most of the buildings have been converted into tacky souvenir shops or tourist trap restaurants, and it’s priced accordingly.
We stayed at Wombats Venice in a 6 bed/ensuite dorm for 29NZD / €17 per bed, per night. This hostel was only a few months old, and the facilities were excellent. The 6-bed room was so big, there could have been 12 beds in there. Wombats is situated in Mestre, which is is the suburb that neighbours Venice island. Right next to the train tracks and the bus stop, it was a 2€ ride onto the island (or, for us, included in our Eurail pass.)
On our first day in Venice, we did the Rick Steves audio tours. The Grand Canal Cruise one requires you to buy a ferry ticket, and as you stand on the left side of the ferry, Rick explains everything you can see from the boat. The St. Marks Square tour follows this one, explaining the history, culture and context of St. Marks Basilica (if you can see it through all the people.) This area was one of the most crowded places we visited in all of Europe.
Our second day was much better. On the east side of Venice island, you can find a whole lot of tiny art galleries, most of which are free to enter. Some are contemporary, some are modern, a few are old, and one was dedicated just to violins. The Peggy Guggenheim Museum is the most famous in this area, but it’s really worth exploring a little further. The area also has a lot of independent art, jewellery and fashion stores.
Overall though, Venice was much nicer after 6pm. All the day-trippers, cruise ships and tour buses had packed up, and we suddenly had space to breathe. The east side became especially cool to explore (though many of the streets aren’t lit, so it did get a little creepy as it got later.
Notable cheap eats in Venice:
Osteria Al Squero (Venice Island) – An amazing selection of bite-sized crostini, topped with everything you can imagine. All flavours 1.5€ each. Make your own combo. Aperol Spritz is cheap as well. There’s no seating, but it’s situated right on a canal, opposite the gondola repair centre, so everyone perches on the wall. We ate here twice, but only because I fell over and dropped our entire lunch in the canal the first time. 🙁
Farini (Venice Island) – Pizza by the slice and great tiramisu. This place is always busy, because it’s cheap and good. Open for lunch and dinner.
La Tana di Oberix (Mestre neighbourhood) – Fantastic pasta, good portions, good price. The scampi we had here was one of the best we had in Italy. They’ve made the strange decision to cover all their windows in curtains, so it looks like they’re closed – but they’re not. Just push the door and go inside.
Da Michele Pizza e Ristò (Mestre neighbourhood) – Share a pizza, a pot of mussels, and a ½ litre of house wine here for 50NZD / €30. Just around the corner from Wombats Hostel.
