Italy Travel Answers

5 cities in 6 days - are you sure? I've spent two weeks in Venice and a week in Rome and not seen anywhere near all there is to see of either. You might just about be able to travel between them in 6 days but mostly all you will see is the countryside between. Not unpleasant, but probably not what you were planning. Seriously, I'd pick two (probably Rome and Venice) and travel by train between them. Split your time up with either 3 days in each or 4 in Rome and 2 in Venice for a first trip (although I'd rather have more time in Venice, but Rome is bigger).

1) No - go by train 2) Trenitalia - trenitalia.com/cms/v/index.j... 3) There are direct trains about every half hour

I agree that this is much too much for the time you have. I think you can skip Milan. Where are you arriving from?

Yes i think Car is important for your tour, it make easy.

Personally I would not even consider such a journey by anything but car. However, there are 6 of you and presumably you all have luggage - this would entail renting a minibus which will cost you in the region of £400.00 (£67.00 each). If you take trains to all the destinations in your itinerary, you will spend a lot more than this, and will see a lot of platforms, ticket offices and railway embankments, and not much else except countryside and houses flying by. Your itinerary is far to optimistic - you just won't get to see any of the sights in any of the destinations. I assume you are intending to book accommodation on the hoof, so this will also take up time (6 guys lugging bags from hotel to hotel in Venice is going to be miserable for you). I assume you are landing in Milan, so why not rent a minibus on-line then pick it up upon arrival - forget looking round Milan, just get straight on the road for Venice. 2 nights in Venice 2 nights in Florence 1 night in Pisa Any more will make your holiday nothing more than a road trip.

1) NO, beside train is faster, you do not know where to leave the car 2) www.trenitalia.com 3) there are, with change in Florence 4) No worry, ýou should not be interested beside the earthquake is still on, check here http://cnt.rm.ingv.it/ If I were you I would cut one or two cities but if you really want to go to all, having an quick sight, dinner and sleep (no much time left for something else), in order to save time for transfer with direct trains, I would do in this order Milan, Venice, Florence, Pisa, Roma.

If you choose to take trains, here is the link for journeys from Venice to Pisa. I have just taken a date at random, but I doubt the timetable will be any different until Trenitalia publish their winter schedules. lefrecce.it/B2CWeb/search.do...

Here is my first question that I am starting to ask when I see questions like this. What is your travel style? - Do you go to places for a quick look just to say you have been there? - Do you have any must sees? - Do you want to stick to a certain schedule or do you want flexibility? - What do you expect the trip to mean to you! These are some of the questions you are hopefully asking yourself I will answer a few of your specific questions 1) my wife and I were in Italy just a few weeks ago and took the train everywhere. I pre-reserved tickets with trenitalia about 4 to 6 weeks ahead of time and got some very good rates with their mini fares - part of my travel style is having specific times to arrive and leave areas so making a time scheduled train or plane works fine for us. 2) if you drive a car where will you park? Consider that especially for the cities you mentioned. 3) the earthquake hit a small portion of Italy. Unless you go to the specific town(s) affected you wouldn't even know anything had happened.

Cheers mate....

Hurrmm....I planned to spend a day in every cities.It will be tiring..of course.. I will be arriving in milan..so I cannot skip milan..

Yeah..thats why I consider to hire a car.. this is more like a roadtrip, backpackers style.. We booked hostels already, Hopefully everything going to be ok

Thank you..will consider that... I really want to explore italy as a whole, but really have time constraint. How is it like when driving in italy.. My mate got many fines last year after got home,

Here is my first question that I am starting to ask when I see questions like this. What is your travel style? - Do you go to places for a quick look just to say you have been there? - Do you have any must sees? - Do you want to stick to a certain schedule or do you want flexibility? - What do you expect the trip to mean to you! These are some of the questions you are hopefully asking yourself I will answer a few of your specific questions 1) my wife and I were in Italy just a few weeks ago and took the train everywhere. I pre-reserved tickets with trenitalia about 4 to 6 weeks ahead of time and got some very good rates with their mini fares - part of my travel style is having specific times to arrive and leave areas so making a time scheduled train or plane works fine for us. 2) if you drive a car where will you park? Consider that especially for the cities you mentioned. 3) the earthquake hit a small portion of Italy. Unless you go to the specific town(s) affected you wouldn't even know anything had happened. My travel style is always compact. I rarely spend more than 3 days in a certain place. I usually start to explore the city/place early in the morning after breakfast...then get back to the hotel late night.. My budget for travel is very limited thats why when I go travel, I make sure I visit everything..sort of go for a quick look...(not very quick I guess) I dun have many ideas about italy 'must sees' places..except few famous attractions in rome and pisa.. I plan to wander around venice..no real plan..same goes to florence..oh gosh..I sound like a very miserable traveler, am i?? I am not really rigid in my schedule..and I expect to release all the stress I have now..holiday after having exam is always good.. When you bought your train tickets, do u made a separate reservation as well?? I heard that one must buy tcket and make reservation separately in Italy..is it true?? Many thanks....

I'm no sure exactly what you mean by buying a train ticket and making a reservation but I'll give you an answer to what I think you mean. When I signed on to the trenitalia website I first selected the particular train I was traveling on (example the train from Rome to Florence leaving at 10:00 on May 3.). If it was a fast train like the one between Rome and Florence then yes I also had to choose our seats at that time as well. On other rides (for example between Pisa and LaSpezia) which were more local and on slower trains (making stops at other stations along the route) we paid after we choose the date and time, but they did not have reserved seats and when we rode those trains we got on and sat down in any available seat.

So it is the same like any other train reservation? Tqvm....

What do you consider - "same like any other train reservation?"

Just buy the ticket and I'm ready to go....? Cuz I read somewhere that one need to buy ticket then... make reservation (with extra charge) and the ticket is not valid without the reservation...

No extra charges. With the fast trains you must reserve a seat when you buy a ticket. Like airline tickets tou could buy one at the last moment, but the train you want could be sold out. With the local trains you can buy ahead like we did for convenience of knowing when you are going, but you could also buy a ticket just before you board at the train station you are leaving from. No assigned seats on these trains, When we pre bought our tickets all we had to do on board was show our printed copy of the reservation (printed on my computer printer at home before we left) to the train conductor when they came through the train to look at tickets. If you buy your ticket at the train station you will need to punch the time on your ticket at one of the yellow boxes in the train station otherwise you could get fined.