I have been working on my father-in-law's war record for a year now on and off and finally it looks like I will be following in his path this year. I did the same in NW Europe a couple of years ago with my father's journey from Normandy to Hamburg and visited many museums related to the war. Italy will be very different as they do not have many war related museums for obvious reasons. We intend to drive from Scotland and take the ferry from Newcastle to the Netherlands then will have to look at the pros and cons of which route to take to Italy. We will be taking our time and expect to be travelling for 5 weeks from the heel of Italy where he landed at Taranto to the River Po. We will be staying in rooms with AirBnb and Agriturismo. I have gleaned a lot of information from this website and would be glad of any other hints and tips for our journey. I have also posted this on WW2 Talk forum but feel this could also be of interest here especially as a lot of Canadian units were involved in the same areas of conflict. I have just about finished a synopsis of his route and will post this soon. We will be travelling through a fair bit of remote mountainous terrain so if anybody has a mule going spare, it would be very welcome.
My father served in Italy beginning at Salerno. It's unlikely that I will travel there so take lots of pictures and be sure to post them here. Have a good trip!
If you plan to go through Rome drop me a hint, and BTW there are probably a lot more military museums in Italy than you probably have time to visit. (off the top of my head 3 decent ones just in the Rome area) but at first glance most are on the Tirrenean rather than the Adriatic side. And BTW I second OP's suggestion, select a very tough mule or at least some very high quality treking shoes, your feet will be grateful. If you plan to do any "off road" one thing I would suggest is to get hold of IGM (Istituto Geografico Militare) large scale maps for the areas you are interested in, there are possibly better "tourist maps" but the IGM ones have a "WW2" feel that might help you a lot to track any features you are looking for.
You are right, there are a lot of museums - I just had to look for them. Aircraft Museum and Military Motor Museum both near Rome. Historiale di Cassino, Po River WW2 Museum, Museo della Guera about the Gothic Line plus remains of of the Line itself near Lucca, Museum of the Battle of Senio NW of Ravenna. All of these have some relevance to my father-in-laws battalion. I hope to visit them all plus their websites have useful information, photographs etc.
You got two out of the 3 Rome area ones I was thinking of. 3rd one is the infantry museum http://www.esercito.difesa.it/storia/musei/Museo-Storico-della-Fanteria that is the only one in the inner city. Nice collection of infantry weapons, some tanks, and strongly recommended if traveling with a non military minded party as it sits against the roman wall, borders a Basilica (Santa Croce in Gerusalemme) and is ten minutes walk from anoher major one (San Giovanni in Laterano) so there is a lot to see for all.
I would also recommend the rather quirky http://museo.pianadelleorme.com/ on the Pontine marshes between the Anzio and Cassino Battlefields. it has a huge collection of vehicles displayed imaginatively.
I agree with Sheldrake. The Piana delle Orme museum is quirky but it is superb. The vehicle collection is to die for and you can touch every single one of them. It is made up of various sheds with each one containing a different theme - Western Desert, Salerno, Anzio, Cassino, Jews and others but for me the most fascinating one was the shed dealing with the draining of the Pontine Marshes in the 20s and 30s. he project was a feat of civil engineering and cost practically broke the country. Regards Frank
I looked at the museum website and it looks so amazing that we may need a two day visit. My husband would spend a full day in the shop alone so I do not know if I should thank you both for the tip.
