I want you to know that from the beginning to end the Amber Road Tour of Southern Italy was fantastic. Professional in every way with a tour manager that was just wonderful, Luca was so much fun and made sure everyone was taken care of. Because of him, my trip with Amber Road Tours is one of the best trips I’ve taken in the past few years. I look forward to traveling with Amber Road Tours in the future.

We just want to thank you for organizing these wonderful tours, fabulous meals, and the excellent tour leaders, Mario and Mariaelena, who made the tours a truly unforgettable experience! Mario organized wonderful restaurants and get-togethers for the group. He provided humor and insight into the workings of Italian politics and the daily lives of the Italians. Mariaelena was as lovely as she was proficient in English. She taught us the differences between the many delicious pastas and regional dishes and was very knowledgeable about the histories of all the towns we visited.

I have been meaning to let you know how happy I was with the tour. We were able to find [our fathers’] villages and take pictures. Mario was wonderful. Everything about the tour was great.

Our second Amber Road Tour and fellow travelling group was a great success. The tour plan was wonderful introducing Ian and I to a part of Italy we had not explored before and the surprise of the agricultural aspect with a great mix of history, seaside cities with Matera, Lecce and Alberobello all wonderful experiences. Our host Anna was just lovely. Her knowledge, humorous repartee, friendly manner to both travellers, guides and hotel staff was outstanding.

Everything was just wonderful, including the weather (which mostly co-operated). Your tour director was exceptional. Calm (in the face of exceptional events), helpful (above & beyond) charming & funny. She & Vincenzo (the driver) made the tour the success it was. Thanks again for a great trip.

A hearty thank you to Amber Road Tours, tour manager Mariaelena, and coach driver Vincenzo, for a fascinating and unforgettable experience exploring Sicily during our October tour of the island. Since we usually travel on our own, we were a little reluctant to sign on with a tour group. However, any initial reservations we had about our decision to tour were completely dispelled by the thoroughness of the tour and the professionalism, care, and good natures of Mariaelena and Vincenzo. The tour group size of 18 was perfect; the accommodations top-notch and well-located; the food abundant and delicious; and the special events such as the wine-tastings and product tastings were lovely treats. Thanks to Mariaelena’s passion for and extensive knowledge of Sicily, we have returned home with a greater understanding and appreciation of the different regions of Sicily, its history, its many cultures and traditions. And thanks to her passion for people, we had a really great time! Grazie mille!

My trip to Sicily was fantastic, due in no small part to our hard-working and very nice guide, Mariaelena, who always went the extra mile for us.  The pace was just right, mixing visits to interesting places with knowledgeable and enthusiastic local guides with time to shop or just relax.  There’s nothing like sitting by the pool in Taormina with a view of the sea and Mt. Etna in the background, while enjoying a bowl of pasta.  Things were very well organized. Everyone in our group had a great time.

Just returned from our Amber Road Tour, and let me tell you, it was great. Our tour guide Anna was spectacular!  She was very attentive to all our needs and her knowledge of the area and history of Italy was very impressive – kudos to you for having such a lovely lady for us to know.

I wanted to take a moment to thank you for a wonderful trip. It was terrific in every way. We liked the pacing; and it was so well organized and smoothly run. The hotels, the food, the guides, all made for a trip beyond our expectations. The best feature, however, was Mariaelena. She was friendly, hard working and had endless energy and enthusiasm. Thank you!

Thank you for the birthday cake and celebration! I don’t recall telling you I was going to be in Italy on my birthday so that was a nice surprise. It was a wonderful tour and everything went well. Anna is the best! I think you are very fortunate to have her in your employment. She interacted with all of us as if we were family.

What a beautiful tour of Italy’s hill towns. Patrick and I enjoyed every step (literally). Mario and Tiziano made our trip seamless, anticipating every one’s needs and helping out when needed. Hope we get to do this again. Also, thank you for being available to answer questions non-tour related.

We loved our Tuscan/Umbrian tour with Amber Road; it was as advertised and then some! The places we visited and the tours we had were wonderful, the attention to detail throughout was much appreciated and both our excellent tour director, Mariaelena, and our super driver Tiziano made every day an adventure! Mariaelena’s ability to “paint a word picture” of the countryside as we drove though it was exceptional; her kindness to all within the group was special; and her pride in her country and province was evident in the best possible way…she is a true gem!
We would pick Amber Roads again for sure and have already recommended it to friends; thanks for making our holiday so very special!

We wanted to let you know how wonderful the tour was for us. The planning was exceptional, the lodging nearly perfect and your choices for dining were just wonderful. We believe we got a very accurate sense of what Italy is truly all about. Thanks so much for your efforts on our behalf.

…been home for about a week now, although my mind still lingers in Italy:) A BIG thank you to Luca, tour guide extraordinaire, for his warmth, humour, knowledge, expertise and professional tour facilitation services! You make Amber Road Tours shine and we are grateful for all that you did to make the tour amazing!! While I can’t say enough about the spectacular scenery & the delicious cuisine, it is indeed the people that make a trip memorable. Thanks again to all of you for sharing in The Big Italian Adventure!

We were part of a large tour in Scotland before the Amber Road tour, and we were again part of a large tour – of Sicily – after Amber Road. We unhesitatingly vote the AR tour the best. We think AR has a winning format with the small numbers in the group. It enables everyone to get to know each other that much better and that undoubtedly adds zest to the tour. The other factor that enhanced our AR tour was the Tour Director Mario Isaia. Always affable and personable, he readily put himself out to go that little further to make everyone relaxed and happy. Our affection for Mario was we know shared by everyone on the tour. The lack of optional extras was a plus plus for AR so far as Angela and I are concerned. In short, Amber Road has a great formula.

The two tours we did with you were amazing, there was not a day that we did not enjoy ourselves thanks to Mario, Luca & the local guides. Both tours were very different from the other which was what we were looking for. It is hard to choose the thing we enjoyed the most. We were fortunate to be able to watch a sculptor working on a marble angel at Carrara, the drive along the Amalfi coast was spectacular and to be practically the only people at the Greek temples at Paestum was magic. Our accommodation and meals were first class and all those steps certainly allowed for plenty of food & wine!! Must compliment Mario & Luca on their help and smooth running of each tour, they are each a unique personality. We will certainly be travelling with you again, hope to do your new tour to the North combined with another in 2013. Our thanks again to all who made our holiday an experience to remember.

Hi Jonathan and Sonya! Don and I enjoyed meeting you! As you know, we had 2 wonderful tours with Amber Road and wish you had them all over the world!! Thank you for all you do to insure that people have a fantastic time when they are in Italy!

My trip to Tuscany with Amber Road in Sept was a wonderful experience. Mariaelena was a great guide, well informed about the region, happy, fun and went out of her way to accommodate the needs of the people in the group. The accommodations were 5 star as well as all the planned meals. Never eliminate Civita or San Mommè from your tour. I guess I like very small villages. It was nice that you and Sonya took the time to have dinner with us.

Thank you, Amber Road Tours and especially Mario, for our wonderful nine days under the Tuscan sun. It was a memorable experience, thoroughly enjoyed by us. We hope to join you again for another magical holiday.

I am writing to thank you for a wonderful tour. There are so many highlights but the visit to Carrara remains a stand-out for me. It was my first trip to Italy and whilst I had some ideas about what it would be like, the experience totally overwhelmed them. Our tour manager, Mario, is an absolute gem who quickly made us feel as though we were old friends. He went out of his way to assist tour members, including my sister and myself. The accommodation and meals provided were exceptional and the weather played its part except for one wet day. The tour provided a variety of activities and places and, as I’d hoped, took us to places we would not have discovered on our own. Well done everyone. A big thank you to Ubaldo for his magnificent driving and cool temperament under great Italian traffic difficulties!

I really enjoyed the Tuscany Liguria tour. Mario and Ubaldo did everything possible to make the trip enjoyable. The Hotel Ilaria in Lucca and the Hotel Davanzati (which you recommended for Florence after the tour) were both excellent. The itinerary was well paced and I was very pleased with the experience. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend Amber Road Tours to other travelers or to go on another vacation with you.

What a fantastic time we had on our recent Tuscany and Umbria tour which surpassed even our high expectations. The itinerary was incredible with such a variety of things to see and do. From the beautiful countryside and hill towns, to the gorgeous medieval buildings and churches, to the plentiful and delicious wine and food, everything was almost perfect. However, that being said, the most special aspect of our tour was getting to spend almost 2 weeks with our incredible tour leader Mariaelena, who is one of the kindest, loving and most enthusiastic people we have ever met. She shared her love for her beautiful country, including her home town, with our entire group, and we will never forget her. We are both looking forward to hopefully doing another tour with you in the future. Thank you again.

The September Tuscan Tour was memorable: the tour itself, lodgings, local tour guides, food & wine and especially Tiziano our intrepid bus driver and Mariaelena. Our guardian angel was warm, a great giggler, inclusive, competent and so proud of her family, her village, her valley and her country. She was always on the job, even at 3:30 AM. She is truly worth her weight in euro, dollars or lira (if it comes to that again). This was our second tour with ART and we were not disappointed.

Thank you, Jonathan and Luca for my recent informative and pleasurable tour of Amalfi/Puglia. I thoroughly enjoyed the group experience and thought the numbers were just right. I appreciated not having to spend hours on the bus and not having to get up too early in the morning. Luca was an entertaining and knowledgeable tour manager and nothing was too much trouble for him. If I had to choose my favourite hotels (they were all good) I liked the ones at Ravello and Matera. I would certainly recommend Amber Road Tours and look forward to booking another one. The only downside to the trip was the long flight home to Australia.

What a wonderful tour we had with Amber Road. The tour manager, the local guides and drivers were all awesome and the food was great. We hope to do Sicily sometime in the future.