Ciao Italy Tours Reviews 353

We would like to thank Nancy Bradford from Nomadic Travel Company in conjuncture with Ciao Italy tours for an amazing, beautiful, personalized trips! They put together our tours of Venice, Bologna, Florence, Sorrento, Amalfi coast, Pompeii and Rome.
Hotels rooms were what we expected but bathroom and showers could have been bigger.
Travelling and transfers were exactly how we requested it! Everything was perfect from start to finish, English speaking vans drivers and trains were on-time, with spacious seats and luggage accommodations. Activity vouchers, with detailed explanation, VIP tickets to skip long lines and tour guides were knowledgeable and friendly.
There was not a day that we did not know what to do or where to go! We are very happy we used Ciao Italy and we would highly recommend them to anyone traveling to Italy.
Michael and Maria.

Valeria from Ciao Italy Tours. Gave the 4 of us a wonderful expericence around Portofino. Valeria is courteous knowledgable about Portofino & the local area. Valeria's driving is very safe & possibly speaks better English than me. We had an FAB time with Valeria. I suggest you ask for her by name.

I have never used a travel company but for my honeymoon I knew my husband and I wanted to see a lot of Italy in a short time and with planning a wedding I just did not have it in me to plan and research a country I did not know much about. So, I was on the hunt to find a travel agent and after getting extremely expensive and out of my budget quotes, I found Ciao Italy. My main concern when using a travel company was the costs, I knew how much I wanted to spend and what we wanted to do and where we wanted to stay, and Ciao Italy listened to everything I said and stayed within my budget. Stefania was who we worked with, and she was a great communicator even with the time differences I never felt uneasy or out of the loop. Everything about our trip was great! We had excellent drivers who were always on time, even early. Our tour guides were so knowledgeable and answered all of our questions. All of the hotels we stayed in were clean, safe, and very accommodating to any of our needs. We learned so much from our tour guides who were all passionate about their cities which was also all of their homes. It made the tours much more interesting to hear from someone who actually lives in the places we were touring. It felt more personal, and I didn't feel like such a tourist. I am very happy we used Ciao Italy and I would highly recommend them to anyone traveling to Italy.

Patricia with Cruise Planners-Fernandina Bch coordinated with Ciao Italy Tours an amazing trip to Italy for me and my friend. We sent them a list of what we wanted to see in Italy and Ciao Italy Tours put together a complete first class trip that not very many people get to experience. Everything was planned in detail for us from the arrival to the airport in Rome to the departure from the airport in Milan as well as everything in between! Great Hotel choices (with pictures), transfers (limos), pick up points, meeting places, Activity vouchers (with detailed explanation), VIP tickets for activities to skip long lines, English speaking drivers and tour guides. There was not a day that we did not know what to do or where to go! On the way to Venezia we got off the train short of our stop (our fault)!! I called Ciao Italy Tours and they got us on the next train within 15 minutes!

Stefania Tinelli - Travel Planner definitely know her business!

If you are planning a trip to Italy…you would be wise to choose Ciao Italy Tours! You will be glad you did…We are! 🤩

As a travel advisor, it is always so important to be able to rely upon our industry partners to be able to provide in depth destination information, best rates available, efficient and attentive service and reliability. I must say, that working with Stefania at Ciao was right on target in directing me to assist my clients in a timely and well informed manner.

My clients made a few last minute modifications regarding dates, hotels and special requests. Stefania never complained at all no matter how many times I had to inform her of another modification. She was quick to respond and provided complete clarification when needed.

My clients returned back from their trip to Italy a few days ago and were thrilled with their experience regarding the seamless flow of their itinerary, the selected hotels ooffered to them and the courteous and professional drivers they experienced.

I would highly recommend working with Stefania at Ciao Italy Tours. She is very knowledgeable, quick to respond and always makes just the right recommendations when needed. Also want to mention, Ciao's owner, Guido, is available to assist whenever there may be an issue that needs to be resolved and a hands on proprietor!

A great company!

We started planning very close to travel dates but Ciao Italy worked with our local agent to get us into great hotels in Florence, Milan, and Rome. They booked tours for us: some private and some small group as well as transportation. The highlight was an expensive private tour of the Vatican Musuem and St Peter's Basilica. Our guide was knowledgeable and friendly but also politely assertive with other tour guides to move us through without waiting anywhere. The architecture, the church, and the extensive collection of artworks, including walls and ceilings completed by Raphael, Michelangelo, and others is so vast that this really is the best way to take as much in as a day allows. Tours of ancient Rome, highlights of Rome, highlights of Florence (Uffizi and Accademia Gallery), and train tickets between cities were included. Details and vouchers were provided for printing.

I am a travel agent and Ciao Italy is my "go to" vendor for creating beautiful personalized trips for my clients for Italy. Guido and Stefania are wonderful to work with along with the entire staff. They make my job so easy, one contact and they do EVERYTHING from hotels, transfers, train tickets, tours. I have used them for both FIT and group travel. The hotels they use are beautiful, the tours are great, and drivers show up when expected. I won't go anywhere else!

We had an incredible trip! We started in Napoli and ended in Sorrento at a beautiful villa. We did private tours of Napoli, Procida, Amalfi (Including a winery tour) and Positano. We also did a private boat tour a Capri. The tours were well organized, on time, captured all the important places to see and the guides had a tremendous amount of information. Everything was amazing and I highly recommend Ciao Italy Tours.

My clients had a wonderful trip to Italy on the Amalfi coast. They rented a villa and it was perfection. Thanks Stefania!

My daughter and I recently traveled to Italy and stayed in Sorrento for a week. All of our adventures were booked through Ciao Italy Tours and were nothing short of amazing! We did a private Marisa Cuomo Winery Tour, a group day boating tour to and around Capri, and a cooking class at Villa Ida -- all were so well organized and made our trip that much more special. The best part was, we didn't have to think or plan anything -- It was all done for us! The guides were friendly and knowledgeable and even gave us recommendations on where to go to eat later in our trip. In addition, we always felt safe everywhere we went. It's a trip we will never forget!

Thank you so much Ciao Italy and Rita from Mystic Valley Travel. Our family trip to the Amalfi Coast and Rome was absolutely wonderful. All of our tours and guides were perfect for our group, we had 2 teenagers with us. They never once were bored or uninterested. We cant wait to book our next trip.

We all just returned back from the most amazing Family Vacation celebrating my cousins 50th Birthday. It was such a fantastic, once of a lifetime experience on our private tours. Mario in Rome was extremely knowledgeable in regards to the Vatican, Sistine Chapel, St. Peter’s Cathedral, Colosseum etc. He made our tour very interesting. Salvatore in Positano, Amalfi Coast, Sorrento and Winery was also extremely informative and entertaining. He and the driver made our long trip alot of fun with music and singing on the way back to our ship. Both tours were awesome and all 11 of us were really impressed with our tours and the guides. Thank you Ciao Italy. 🇮🇹❤️😘

Thank you to Stefania for handling all the arrangements for private touring in Rome and Amalfi Coast for my family reunion clients. Stefania was great to work with and my clients had an amazing time!

Another amazing trip for my clients in the books.
Thank you Stefania and Guido for your patience and diligence on my clients' trip to Italy.

From the clients:
"Good morning from Rome, the hotel is awesome. The trip to Naples and Pompeii were a hit!!! The guide Maximo was fantastic. Thank you for arranging the trip which is going great so far" .

I recommend Ciao Italy greatly!!!!!

As a travel agent, it is not always what I can do for my travelers, but the support I receive from Stefania and Ciao Italy! My travelers would not have had the experience without Stefania's careful attention to detail and making sure everything was perfect for a large family! See their comments!
"Thanks so much for everything. It was a trip of a lifetime and one we will remember forever. The hotel in Rome is super swank. Also the business class on the trains, and all the airport transfers have been seamless and easy. This trip has just been amazing. Thank you."

Our travel agent put us in touch with Ciao Tours. Everything was great and would absolutely use them again. Great tour guides!

I love working with Stefania to put together wonderful trips for our clients. Always professional and attentive!

Please, you absolutely knew I was not happy. I just didn’t get to this because I’ve been busy moving. A dinner with friends last night where we were discussing this trip triggered me to get back to it. And for the record, that gondola ride in Venice never showed up. Just one more item I could have mentioned. There are others. Also I never, ever discussed budget restrictions with you.

Where do I start...

My wife and I and my two daughters book a trip with this outfit to Venice, Florence, Rome and Positano. Big$$$

Be warned these guys are a tour booking company " NOT" a travel agent. They can't even book flights on their own. They use some travel agent to do that. What does that mean? It means they have no concept of how to organize a trip to make it convenient and enjoyable. Their goal is the sell your tours.

1) I make it more than perfectly clear that I wanted the best accommodations. Now I understand a 5 star hotel in Italy is not quite like 5 star hotels in major US cities. Not even close I understand that. But while I was booked in 4 to 5 star hotels, I was given the absolute lowest class room the hotels could offer. In Venice we our one window overlooked the canal between two buildings maybe 10 ft. apart. With added benefit of being the location where the garbage was thrown out every morning onto barges. Room booked was so small I could pass the bed without squeezing sideways. No way we would fit in there with luggage. Needless to say I had to upgrade at an additional cost. In Florence we had to do the same. In Rome the hotel was at least a little more modern, but my daughters had a room where the shower was open to the room in front of the bed! In Positano we stayed in a beautiful hotel on the beach that overlooked the ocean, but of course our rooms faced a side street and building and again over the area where they flung bags of bottles from the restaurants onto the garbage trucks from 10 ft. high at 3:00 AM. every day. Remember..., save money for tours...

2) Transfers / Transportation

Remember there are 4 of us, 3 woman with luggage for 13 days, plus carry on. These geniuses have us traveling on what is basically a commuter train from city to city! You get dropped in the station and told to watch the board for your train Dragging your luggage around. You are on your own getting your luggage to the car your booked in. We had to fling the luggage from the platform onto the train, hoping it wouldn't start pulling out. These trains are not designed for travelers with luggage. There is nowhere to store luggage except i small overheads designed for brief cases. Image asking 60 year old's and two young girls to hoist 50 lb. bags on to overheads! I called to complain and ended u paying another $2k+ for private transportation. Keep in mind I was already in for $30k to these guys.

3) The tours, the many tours, the too many tours.

These tours are individually booked. For most, no one is picking you up at the hotel. You are on you own finding the meeting places. You get instructions like "meet at the small wooden booth near the post office in St Marks Square". St Marks Square is huge. Plus your dropped by bot nowhere near it. So first, find St Marks Square, the this wooden box. It took 45 minute s of wandering around to find it. Amazing, no one in Italy seems to know where anything is.

The walking tours are endless and exhausting. These guys see no issue in booking 2 in one day. One all day tour in Tuscany started with one of the endless walking tours in Sienna, some other thing and then a tour of a vineyard with dinner. Between these activities there are several 30 to 45 minute cramped van rides. By the time we got to the vineyard it was dark. What could you possible see in the dark in the hills of Tuscany. We needed flashlights just to move around without killing ourselves. Now its around 8:30 and we haven't eating since breakfast. Dinner was a small bowl of fennel and some cheese and bread served family style. We were starving. Again here the goal is to sell you wine, nothing else. We get dropped back around 11:30 at the tour office in the middle of nowhere with no way to get back to the hotel. 12:30 before we made our way back only because the tour driver was kind enough to take us back. After this ordeal Ciao has us booked at 8:15 AM for another tour! This tour said "meet" at 8:15" at another obscure location that the cab driver had trouble finding. We manage to get there at 8:20 only to find the tour left! Where does "meet" mean "we leave"? we managed to call the local tour company who told us "oh your can meet them at the museum, it's only a 1/2 hour walk! All the tours were like that, no consideration of our time or how inconvenient it would be. Just book, book, book. In Positano we gave up and just didn't go anymore. A lot more to that story, I continue on another day.

My travel agent partnered with Ciao Italy to help with our summer vacation to Rome. It was a wonderful experience with timely drivers (in very clean and comfortable cars) and a lovely hotel in central Rome. Highly recommend!

Guido at Ciao Italy made our first trip to Italy go seamlessly perfect! All we had to do was show up! The Amalfi Coast driving tour with our driver, Marco, was absolutely incredible with the most breath taking views! We cannot wait to book another trip!