Greece & Italy Tour Recommendations - Family of 4 with 2 young children...

[yyzgurl]

I probably should have started planning our excursions earlier and I hope it's not too late.

 

Our family will be sailing on the Emerald Princess on June 12. We don't want to do the cruise excursions and would rather find our own private tours, especially with two little ones in tow.

 

What tour operators would you recommend in the following cities:

 

Florence (We are leaning towards hitting Firenze and Prada outlet - can we grab a taxi to take us?)

Naples

Athens

Santorini

Kusadasi, Turkey

Mykonos

Katakolon

 

Any help would be GREATLY appreciated!

[sea-explorer]

Kusadasi Turkey.

 

I would think your best options would be Levent Solmaz

 

http://leventsolmaz.com/

 

or Lale or Kagan Kosagon

 

http://www.tourguidesinturkey.com/

 

Katakolon

 

Try George

http://www.taxikatakolon.gr/

 

Sorry, no experience of your other ports.

[martodd]

We used rome in limo for Rome last year. http://www.romeinlimo.com Carlo was our driver and we had a great day. We are a family of 5 (7,10,14) last year. I would not go any other way now, it was nice having the flexibility to alter the days plans if needed and having someone there just to cater to us.

We will be using them in Naples and Florence this year. The nice thing is we gave them a list of what we want to do, and they work out a tour based on that.

Sorry I can't help you with the other ports.

Good luck.

[Destin Mom]

Hi yyzgurl. We are traveling on a similar itinerary with young children in July. We are using the following (after lots of research on three message boards and having traveled without the kids to some of the places but not on a cruise):

- Athens- using Paul with Athens Taxi

- Ephesus- using Ekol

- Olympia- tried to get George but we was booked already by someone else on our ship. Currently on a 4 hour ship tour but may cancel and rent a car.

- Santorini- doing it on our own

- Mykonos- doing it on our own

 

Florence/ Naples- we had looked at options and decided to tour independently via an extra week and a half of land based travel to have more time.

 

I think you are right on with young kids- better off to have private tours as much as possible so you can stay flexible. Make sure you fit in time for ice cream stops, animal feedings (birds, fish, etc- keep your bread crusts from lunch), parks, etc. Keeps them happy. Also, have them keep a travel journal (bring a glue stick and tape). We wrote our children's best/ worst/ most memorable experiences for them since they were too young to write. Very fun to look back at. Have a blast!

[Destin Mom]

Jesse- thanks for the info. For the donkeys in Santorini, will they let you ride with your children? How old were your kids when they did it? Our kids are comfortable on horses but have no donkey riding experience :)

[mandotsan]

I probably should have started planning our excursions earlier and I hope it's not too late.

 

Our family will be sailing on the Emerald Princess on June 12. We don't want to do the cruise excursions and would rather find our own private tours, especially with two little ones in tow.

 

What tour operators would you recommend in the following cities:

 

Florence (We are leaning towards hitting Firenze and Prada outlet - can we grab a taxi to take us?)

Naples

Athens

Santorini

Kusadasi, Turkey

Mykonos

Katakolon

 

Any help would be GREATLY appreciated!

 

As you have probably seen in other post Romeinlimo would be my choice, contact them tell them what your interested in and they will put together a great tour bar none...or just take the ones they have set up as basic tours. At any rate it will surpass anything that the cruise line has come up with.

[nash7300]

I probably should have started planning our excursions earlier and I hope it's not too late.

 

Our family will be sailing on the Emerald Princess on June 12. We don't want to do the cruise excursions and would rather find our own private tours, especially with two little ones in tow.

 

What tour operators would you recommend in the following cities:

 

Florence (We are leaning towards hitting Firenze and Prada outlet - can we grab a taxi to take us?)

Naples

Athens

Santorini

Kusadasi, Turkey

Mykonos

Katakolon

 

Any help would be GREATLY appreciated!

 

 

Hi there! Like many of the others on these boards, we used romeinlimo and were very pleased. We used them in Florence, Naples and Rome. We were a group of 6, and the were very accomodating to our varying needs and our schedule. Besides being very punctual, informative and professional, they were flexible and fun, a necessity when travelling with kids! They made lots of gelato stops for us big kids too! Have a great trip!

[jesse]

Since I went down on the cable car, I can only tell you that my three--all college and beyond 'macho' guys, were shell shocked when they got off the donkeys down on terra firma. I can tell you from what they said, that you are traveling down about 800 to a thousand feet, the donkeys are on a path that has a wall on both sides-altho my kids did tell me that the wall seems short because it sort of reaches up to the bottom of the donkey. I don't suggest trying to walk down the donkey stairs-a friend of mine did that and there is a lot of donkey matter on those stairs. The donkeys are being led, and I believe it would be one person one donkey, but not sure at all. Other people on this board will have that info. My kids will never forget it, for sure. What you can do is walk down to where the donkeys are stationed, watch others leave, and decide at that point. Also if you look at some of the pictures you can find online of Santorini you will see what down means--lots of people love the donkeys. We still laugh about seeing their faces at the bottom-

[jesse]

we rented a car when we got off the ship and went out on our own-worked great, reasonable cost, great day

[JoeyJoJoShabadu]

Cabs form Kusadasi to Ephesus at end of port. sign with cost. Cheaper by about 4x than hte excursion. He waits for you there too.

 

Katakalon the same thing. Just ask price. Wasn't bad for 4 of us (we paired up with 2 more). He waits there too.

 

Athens.. metro/subway is fastest to Acropolis.

 

Mykonos... there's a bus stop on far side of town that goes to the beaches. Don't walk from the port to town however, get on the shuttle bus.

 

Take the donkey in Santorini... it's fun. and more peopel in line for cable car.

 

That should get you started.

[betonic]

I have an 8 year old and the last two years he's been to Europe. Below are the tour operators that I used in each place.

 

Athens - Paul We went to the Acropolis, to see the changing of the guard, the war museum and my son went climbing all over the planes, to the Zoo and then to the Plaka for some shopping. We also had lunch in a great local restaurant and ate yummy baklava.

 

Katakalon - George We went to Olympia in the morning and the to the beach for a few hours where my son was building castles with George's daughter.

 

Naples and Florence - Fabrizio from allarounditaly.net. We've spent more than 15 days touring with Fabrizio in the last 3 years and you can't go wrong with him.

 

Kusadasi - Ekol We went to the small village (can't remember the name) and then to the train museum where my son again went climbing. After lunch we went to the water park for a few hours.

 

Santorini - Santorini Sailing semi-private catamaran tour. By far one of the best ever tours we've ever taken. We did not do the donkeys and my son wasn't interested at all.

 

Never been to Mykonos.