LA DOLCE VITA · ON TWO WHEELS
See the city the way the locals ride it.
Reviews of the best Vespa and scooter tours on earth, city by city. A sidecar past the Colosseum and the Chianti hills out of Florence, the Amalfi coast road and the backstreets of Hanoi, sunrise at Angkor by tuk-tuk. The little engine that turns a place into a feeling.
Rides with a signature
Three rides you can only take here.
You can rent a scooter almost anywhere. But a vintage sidecar through Rome at golden hour, a Vespa climb from Florence into the Chianti hills, and a pillion run through the food stalls of Hanoi belong to those streets alone.
Rome, Italy
A Sidecar Through the Eternal City
There is one image the whole world has of Rome on two wheels, and you can actually book it: a vintage Vespa sidecar threading the lanes at golden hour while someone else drives. You lean back past the Colosseum and the Trevi, duck down a cobbled vicolo to a fountain with nobody around, and stop for a cone and a coffee the locals rate. No map, no parking, just the city sliding by from the best seat in it.
- 1 Vespa Sidecar Tour By Night with Pickup
- 2 Rome Morning Vespa Sidecar Tour in Rome with Cappuccino
- 3 Rome Vespa Scooter Tour with Professional Photographer
Florence, Tuscany
Renaissance Start, Chianti Finish
You begin in the city of Brunelleschi and Botticelli and within the hour you are out of it, climbing into the Chianti hills on a road built for a Vespa. Cypress lines, stone farmhouses, a family winery for a long lunch with the vines dropping away below. Some run a classic Vespa, some a little Fiat Topolino; either way you come back with wine on your breath and the best of Tuscany behind you.
- 1 Florence Vespa Tour: Tuscan Hills and Italian Cuisine
- 2 Chianti Vespa Tour with Lunch from Florence & E-car Option
- 3 From Florence: Tuscan Countryside Vespa Tour with Tastings
Hanoi, Vietnam
Pillion Through the Old Quarter
Hanoi makes no sense until you are on the back of a bike in it. A local rider, often a young woman in an ao dai, swings you into the river of scooters, threads the food stalls of the Old Quarter, squeezes down Train Street as the express thunders past inches away, then parks at a plastic-stool kitchen for the bowl of the night. It is loud, it is fast, and it is the only way to feel the city move.
- 1 Ninh Binh HIGHTLIGHT & HIDDEN GEM Tour From Hanoi: Skip-The-Line
- 2 Vespa City Tour &Train Street Female With Ao Dai Riders 4,5 Hours
- 3 Hanoi Vespa Tours: Food + Culture + Fun on Army Vespa
Start here
If you only book one ride.
The single most popular tour on the site. A safe first booking in a city you are still finding your feet in, and the one most travellers come back raving about.
The most popular
The World’s Most Popular Vespa Tours
Rome, Florence, Hanoi, the Amalfi coast, Siem Reap. The rides travellers book first, in the cities they most want to feel from the saddle rather than the pavement.
Where to ride
Pick a city and twist the throttle.
Rome for the sidecars and the gelato stops. Florence for the Chianti hills. The Amalfi coast for the cliff road. Hanoi for the backstreets and the street food, Siem Reap for Angkor by tuk-tuk, Naples for the bay and the run to Pompeii. The world’s great two-wheel cities, each with the rides worth booking.
First time on two wheels
How do you want to ride?
Before the city, pick the seat. Ride in the sidecar and just look, take the controls yourself, or hop on the back with someone who does this every day. There is a right answer for everyone.
Rome, Italy
Rome was made for a Vespa.
No city wears the scooter better. The lanes are too narrow for a car and too long for your feet, and a Vespa threads them like it was designed to, because it was. You swing past the Colosseum and the Pantheon, duck into a piazza for a coffee standing at the bar, climb the Aventine for the view, and stop for gelato where the queue is all locals. A morning sidecar with a cappuccino, or a golden-hour ride as the stone turns honey.
See the best Rome Vespa tours →Florence & the Chianti hills
Ride out of the Renaissance.
The best Florence tours barely stay in Florence. Within half an hour the duomo is behind you and the road is climbing into Chianti: cypress avenues, stone borghi, vines in every direction. You pull in at a family winery for a long lunch, taste what they pour, and roll back down through the hills as the afternoon goes gold. A classic Vespa for the riders, a Fiat Topolino for everyone else.
See the best Florence Vespa tours →The best part
The engine catches and the city opens up.
The best moment of any Vespa tour is the first one: the engine catches, you pull out into the lane, and the streets you have been trudging all week start to flow. The wind is warm, the breaks come without thinking, and side streets, shortcuts and corners you would never have found go past one after another. For an hour the whole shape of the place finally makes sense, the way the people who live there feel it every day.
Browse every Vespa & scooter tour →Southeast Asia
Where the scooter runs the streets.
In Vietnam and Cambodia the scooter is not a tour, it is the city itself: a moving river of bikes that the food, the markets and the morning all flow along. Ride pillion through Hanoi’s Old Quarter and down Train Street, chase street food across Saigon after dark, drift the rice-paddy lanes of Hoi An, or roll the temple roads of Angkor by tuk-tuk at first light. A local rider takes you where no bus, and no nervous tourist, could go.
- 1 Ninh Binh HIGHTLIGHT & HIDDEN GEM Tour From Hanoi: Skip-The-Line
- 2 Hoi An Countryside Vespa Tour: Food, Culture & Daily Life
- 3 Hoi An Vespa Tours: Hoi An Highlights and Hidden Gems
How far do you want to go?
A loop, a coast road, or a whole day out.
Some rides are a couple of hours around the old town; some run out to the sea or deep into the hills. Pick how far you want to ride, and we will point you at the tour that owns it.
A couple of hours
A loop around the old city.A sidecar or a ride through the centre: the Colosseum, the Trastevere lanes, a fountain you would never find on foot, a gelato stop and back before lunch.
Half a day
Out onto the coast road.Trade the city for the cliffs: the corniche above the sea, lemon groves and fishing villages, a long lunch with Positano stacked up below you.
A full day
Into the hills until sundown.A whole day in the saddle through the Chianti hills: cypress lanes, a vineyard for lunch, hill towns between the vines, home as the light goes amber.
The coast road
The best road in Italy was built for two wheels.
The Amalfi coast road is a ribbon of hairpins cut into the cliff, and on a Vespa it is sublime: too tight for the tour coaches that clog it, slow enough to take in every cove and lemon grove. You ride out from Sorrento with the Bay of Naples behind you, hang over the wall above Positano, stop for granita where the village tumbles to the sea, and lean into bends that frame a new blue postcard at every turn.
See all 15 Amalfi Coast tours →By city
Pick a city and twist the throttle.
Rome for the sidecars and the cobblestones. Florence for the Chianti hills. The Amalfi coast for the cliff road. Hanoi for the Old Quarter and the street food. Saigon for the city after dark. Siem Reap for the temples of Angkor by tuk-tuk.
By country & region
Where in the world are you riding?
From the cities and coast roads of Italy to the scooter traffic of Vietnam, the temple lanes of Cambodia and the tuk-tuks of Madeira. Pick the part of the world you are headed for and see what is in the saddle.
Espresso to sunset
A perfect day on a Vespa.
Not sure how a day on two wheels comes together? Here is how the best ones run, from the first coffee and a ride through the old town to chasing the sunset back home.
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