18 nights, Civitavecchia (Rome) to Civitavecchia (Rome)

The itinerary, port by port

15 calls over 18 nights, round-trip from Civitavecchia (Rome). Open any port for my full day-ashore guide, what to see, when to go, and how the day actually runs.

Getting there: Flights to Civitavecchia (Rome) (FCO) are already bookable for these dates. I watch the fare for booked clients so you book at the right moment. When to book your flights →

1. Embark
   Civitavecchia (Rome)

   Civitavecchia is Rome's deepwater port, a working harbor about 80 km northwest of the capital, and for most travelers it is the gateway rather than the destination. Port guide →

2. 2
   Amalfi

   Amalfi is the namesake town of the Amalfi Coast, a former maritime republic wedged into a ravine where the mountains drop straight to the Gulf of Salerno. Port guide →

3. 3
   Cagliari (Sardinia)

   Cagliari is the capital of Sardinia, a layered Italian port city where a medieval hilltop citadel, the Castello, looks down over the harbor and the arcaded Via Roma runs right along the waterfront. Port guide →

4. 4
   Cartagena

   Cartagena is Colombia's old Caribbean fortress city, a UNESCO-listed walled town of balconied colonial houses, plazas, and the largest Spanish fort built in the Americas. Port guide →

5. 5
   Málaga

   Málaga is the working capital of the Costa del Sol and the birthplace of Picasso, and its old town packs a Moorish hilltop fortress, a 1st-century BC Roman theater, and an unfinished Renaissance cathedral… Port guide →

6. 6
   Tangier

   Tangier sits where the Mediterranean meets the Atlantic at the Strait of Gibraltar, a Moroccan port city with a walled medina, a hilltop kasbah, and a long history as an international crossroads. Port guide →

7. 7
   Alicante

   Alicante is a working Costa Blanca city that puts a hilltop Moorish fortress, a marble seafront promenade, and a maze-like medieval quarter inside a single walkable radius from the cruise pier. Port guide →

8. 8
   Barcelona

   Barcelona packs Gaudí's modernisme, a 2,000-year-old Roman and medieval core, and a working Mediterranean waterfront into a single dense, walkable city. Port guide →

9. 9
   Valencia

   Spain's third city pairs a dense medieval core, where the Holy Grail sits inside a Gothic cathedral, with Calatrava's white modernist science city built into a drained riverbed. Port guide →

10. 10
    Palma de Mallorca

    Palma is the capital of Mallorca and the largest city in the Balearics, built in warm honey-colored sandstone around a sandstone Gothic cathedral that rises straight off the seafront. Port guide →

11. 11
    Palamós (Girona)

    Palamós is a working fishing town on the Costa Brava, set in one of the deepest bays in the western Mediterranean, where the cruise quay sits inside the urban fabric rather than at an industrial terminal. Port guide →

12. 12
    Marseille

    Marseille is France's oldest city and its second largest, a working Mediterranean port with Greek and North African roots layered into its streets and food. Port guide →

13. 13
    Genoa

    Genoa is a dense, layered port city that ran a maritime empire, with a UNESCO-listed core of Renaissance palaces and one of Europe's largest preserved medieval quarters threaded by the caruggi, its tall… Port guide →

14. 14
    Villefranche-sur-Mer (Nice)

    Villefranche-sur-Mer is a pastel fishing town wrapped around one of the deepest natural harbors on the Riviera, which is why ships anchor here instead of in Nice. Port guide →

15. Disembark
    Livorno (Florence)

    Livorno is a working Tuscan port, and for most travelers it is the gateway rather than the destination: about 80 km and 90 minutes inland lies Florence, the birthplace of the Renaissance, with Pisa roughly… Port guide →