Italy was unified in the nineteenth century, and a week on the ground still feels like several older countries sharing a railway. Rome, Florence, Venice and Milan are the names that fill a first itinerary because they are famous and because the trains between them are straightforward. South of Naples the pace and the infrastructure change. The Alps and the lakes are another trip again. Italian is the language you need for a pharmacy and a station announcement; English covers museums and hotels in the famous centres.
High-speed Frecciarossa and Italo trains make the Turin–Milan–Rome–Naples spine easy. Regional trains are slower and cheaper and how you reach a hill town. Cities are walked. Driving into a historic centre is how you collect a fine from a camera. August is the month when Italians leave the cities for the coast; some neighbourhood restaurants simply shut.
The practical bottleneck in the famous cities is often a ticket with a time slot, not a map. Museums, palaces and the Vatican run on reservations in season. That is a planning problem as much as a cultural one. Eat where a neighbourhood still has a grocer if you can. One region done slowly will tell you more than a checklist of capitals.
