Turin is Italy's most underrated major city. While tourists flock to Rome, Florence, and Venice, the former capital of the Savoy kingdom quietly offers world-class museums, one of Europe's most impressive collections of Baroque architecture, and a food and cafe culture that rivals anywhere on the peninsula. The elegant grid of arcaded streets, the sweeping views of the Alps from nearly every vantage point, and the River Po winding through riverside parks give the city a grandeur that constantly surprises first-time visitors.
The city is home to the Museo Egizio, the most important Egyptian collection outside Cairo, and the Mole Antonelliana, a 167-metre spire that now houses the National Cinema Museum and has become Turin's unmistakable symbol. Palazzo Reale, Palazzo Madama, and the surrounding Savoy residences (a UNESCO World Heritage Site) form a circuit that could keep you busy for days. Then there is the Lingotto, Fiat's former car factory, reinvented by Renzo Piano as a cultural centre with an art gallery on the roof.
But Turin is not just about museums and palaces. The city invented Italian chocolate-making and the aperitivo tradition here is arguably the country's best -- nearly every bar in the centre lays out generous buffets of food with your evening drink. The historic cafes, with their gilded mirrors and marble counters, are destinations in their own right. And with the Alpine ski resorts of Bardonecchia, Sestriere, and Sauze d'Oulx barely an hour away, Turin is also the natural base for winter sports in the region that hosted the 2006 Winter Olympics.