16 Day Greece - Italy

Greece | Oct 27 - Nov 11, 2023

I hope I do this justice with my lack of written skills. We loved our trip. I have always planned my own travels, even international. This was my first time using any kind of travel service including kimkim.com. All I can say is that it was fabulous. The planning was an easy interactive process between us and our specialist Rebecca Skevakis.

Deposits and final payment was handled online and very easy. We received a very comprehensive trip app that had all our information to include city guides, tickets for planes, trains and activities. All of the transfers were by private car and everyone was on time, and we had several.

We started by arriving in Athens Greece, we were met by a representative who gave us an overview of how things worked, along with a nice gift of goodies. After this we left on our flight to Santorini. There our driver met us and drove us to out hotel. We had several wonderful events; half day on a catamaran sailboat visiting sites around the caldera with wonderful service and food. We did a Sights and Wine tour and Lazarus was a fantastic and intensely knowledgeable guide. He has a very genuine love of Thira and its history. The food and wine on this trip was more than we had expected, very top notch. There was also included a detailed hike guide to go along the cliff side trail between Fira and Oia, we had this planned in our travels but decided to use the time to see more of Oia.

Our trip took us to Athens next where we had a great guided tour of the Acropolis, our Guide Nicholas was not only knowlable but has spent most of his career involved in the restorations. The Acropolis is a sight as the sun sets.

A highlight was a trip out to Delphi, it is a long trip there and back but our guide and driver was very knowalgable. The ruins were breathtaking and we had a nice meal afterwards before the return trip.

After our speedy Athen nights it was off to Italy for a week. Again the transfers to the airport and hotels were flawless. The trip app updates automatically with flight information and gate updates. We arrive and Naples and our driver Pasquale was there to meet us. We drove to Pompeii for another guided tour, our guide was a wealth of knowledge and very entertaining. Pasqual drove us on to our hotel in Sorrento pointing out history and sights along the way.

Our Sorrento leg as was dampened a bit by some rain and wind which canceled our ferry to Capri but the next day it was perfect. Ferry company did not make the change very easy, this is the one and only negative of the trip, a small one in the bid scheme of things.

Off to Revello for a couple of nights, our driver once again was Pasquale. We made the drive along the Amalfi coast road with a short unplanned stop to see some of Positano. This was unplanned but Pasquale was nice enough to make it work out. We did not have any pre planned activities in Ravello but used the city guide provided in the trip App to find places to eat and see. The Villa Rufolo and Cimbrone are the must see sights. One day we also walked down to Amalfi from Ravello, about and hour and a half with our stops to take pictures. We opted to take a taxi back, wimps I know!

Finally it was time to start our journey home. The drive from Ravello to the Naples train station was by our favorite, Pasquale. It was nice having the same drive for all these transfers. It was the same in Santorini and Athens, the drivers were the same for arrival and departure.

The high speed train between Naples and Rome was nice and out transfer to our hotel by the Rome airport was uneventful. We had seen Rome on other trips so as we like to do we stay at a hotel at the airport to allow for a less hectic departure day.

I highly recommend kimkim for your travels. I was apprehensive because I thought I was always saving lots of money doing it all on my own. Well I am here to tell you the extra paid for the services is not terrible and worth every penny for two reasons. One, the headache of getting from airport or train station to hotels or between cites is a time saver because it is all taken care of. There is know searching for a taxi or bus, waiting in long lines, guessing if the taxi is charging too much. Second the communication between us and Rebecca our travel specialist was so nice, its concierge service for the entire trip.