Italy Vacation Recap & Recommendations

We just got back from a magical trip to Italy to celebrate our 10 year wedding anniversary, and as promised, I am sharing our Italy vacation recap with everything we did and all our recommendations for where to stay, where to eat and what to do. We spent a total of five days in Italy (because kids). We flew into Rome and spent a day exploring the city before taking a train to Naples and then a car to Positano for two days, where we also got to see some of the Amalfi Coast. We visited Capri for a day and then flew home. It was a whirlwind trip to Italy for sure, but we love to travel and explore and wanted to pack a lot in during the short window we got to be away from the kiddos. It can be hard to get away when you have kids, especially when they’re little and a lot to handle, and it takes a true village to get everyone cared for and where they need to be when you’re away, so we felt really lucky to have the time we did, but we could have certainly spent two weeks or even a month traveling and had more to explore. But that’s not where we’re at right now, and we’re so grateful for our magical time in Italy and I’m glad we were able to pack so much in. In any event, as promised, I am excited to share a recap of our trip to Italy with all my recommendations for Rome, Positano and Capri. 

Here is my Italy vacation recap with Rome, Positano, and Capri guides. 

ROME RECOMMENDATIONS   

We had a brief but jam-packed 24-hour stay in Rome, so I’m including it in my Italy vacation recap. I’m glad we made the stop instead of flying into Naples, which is closer to Positano, the Amalfi Coast and Capri. That’s usually the move to get more time in the Amalfi Coast and Capri. But we hadn’t been to Rome in years, so we wanted to spend a day doing all the sight seeing things again. Upon arrival, we headed straight out to explore before coming back to our hotel to change and heading to dinner. We checked off many of the sites on our first afternoon after we arrived and then we went to a late dinner and woke up early the next day to get in Vatican City and the Colosseum before heading to Positano. It was a good way to break up the sites and to get in lots of exploring and walking without getting overwhelmed. Here are our recs for what to see, where to stay and where to eat in Rome. 

What to See

Vatican City and Sistine Chapel (book a tour of the Sistine Chapel – it’s worth it!)

Colosseum

Pantheon

Spanish Steps

Font de Trevi

Roman Forum

Palatine Hill

St. Peter’s Basilica

Catacombs of Rome

Castel Sant’Angelo

Borghese Gallery

Arch of Constatine

Where to Eat

We didn’t have tons of time to eat, but I wanted to include where we loved from this trip as well as past trips and the top recommended place from friends in my Italy vacation recap.

Ad Hoc (near Spanish Steps)

Pierluigi

Taverna Trilussa

Ristorante “alla” Rampa

180grammi Pizzeria Romano

Aromo

Marco Martini

Pulejo Rome

Where to Stay

Hotel De La Ville

The St. Regis Rome

Hotel Artemide

Hotel De Russie

Hotel Eden

Portrait Roma

Hassler Roma

POSITANO & AMALFI COAST RECOMMENDATIONS

I highly recommend staying in Positano. There are a few different options depending on where you want to be, so I included all of them in this section of my Italy vacation recap.

Il San Pietro di Positano

This hotel is located closer to the water and a bit further from town, but it’s such a beautiful spot. The views are amazing, the rooms are great and it also has an amazing restaurant.

Hotel Poseidon

If you want to be closer to town, Hotel Poseidon in in a great location where you can easily walk to town and the water and beach, you get the views of being slightly up higher, and the hotel’s views can’t be beat. The restaurant – le Tridente – has an amazing buffet brunch and they also serve a great lunch and dinner with unbeatable views. While the Sirenuse gets all the attention, we much prefer Hotel Poseidon, which is a bit more low-key but just as nice and has the same beautiful views and amenities. 

Le Sirenuse

This is always the go-to if you want to be centrally located and all the celebs come here. We loved it and the restaurant is great, but for the price, I felt it was a bit overrated and preferred some of the other nearby options.

Hotel Il Pellicano

We did not stay here, but this is the hotel to stay if you’re looking to go all out. It’s a destination itself, with breathtaking views, amazing service and food. It’s not walking distance to town or other sites, and we wanted to be closer to it all, but if we had more time and were looking for a romantic, luxurious hotel to relax and were planning to spend more time in our hotel, we would have stayed there. It has its own beach and pool club, spa, and restaurants so it’s a great home base for a relaxing vacation but you can still explore the surroundings from there and they’ll facilitate everything.

CAPRI RECOMMENDATIONS

For some reason, despite having traveled all over Italy, we had never been to Capri, so we wanted to make the effort to visit while in town and I’m including everything we did/love/were recommended by friends who have spent lots of time there in my Italy vacation recap. You could really have spent a week in Capri and had the best time. There’s so much to explore and see and the hotels there are amazing. Capri has shopping, sightseeing, beaches, amazing restaurants and luxurious hotels as well as cool excursions like the Blue Grotto you can do. The one thing I’ll say is that we were there in April, which is at the start of the season and it was pretty crowded with lots of tourists. People warned that it gets really crowded in summertime, and I can see that. I don’t love crowds (like the type where tour buses and boats drop off loads of people) and it makes it hard to get a cab or restaurant reservation etc.. Capri did feel more action-packed, but we were happy that we spent more time in Positano and made that our home base. Still, you really can’t go wrong however you go.

Where to Stay

Hotel Caesar Augustus: We loved this hotel in Anacapri. It’s tucked away from the crowds and town, and offers the most beautiful views.Definitely not a place for kids imo, but we loved that. Even if you don’t stay there, you have to eat at the restaurant – the views are insane.

Hotel La Palma (in town)

Capri Tiberio Palace

Hotel Excelsior Parco

Where to Eat

Panorama for dinner (closet to town)

Bagni Tiberio for lunch

Da Paulino (great for pics and dinner)

Ristorante il Geranio for dinner

Cesar Augustus Hotel (the views are insane!)

What to Do

We started at the bottom and walked all the way up literally 20,000 flights of stairs to town. There is a funicular and open air taxis and buses you can take but we started hiking it before we realized how far a walk it was. But we definitely earned our gelato! The town has tons of shops and reminded me a bit like Fifth Avenue and Worth Avenue with all the luxury stores as well as some cute boutiques and great restaurants. 

Just walking around is fun but you can also spend some time at the beach. There’s a fabulous beach club called Fontanella Beach Club that I highly recommend if you have the day and the weather is nice.  

If you want to make Positano or Capri or a spot on the Amalfi Coast your home base, there are ferries that run between all of the islands as well as private boats you can take. They’re all about 40-60 minutes from each other by boat, so it makes for an easy trip and great way to see more while you’re in the area. We love exploring so we loved how easy it was to get from one island to the next and pack it all in in a finite period of time. 

And I think that’s everything fro my Italy vacation recap, but let me know if I have left anything out.