Chamonix to Lake Como transportation

You are sort of in a pickle, aren't you? Traveling between small towns (worse if one or both are mountain towns) in two different countries is nearly always extra challenging.

I'm not familiar with that area, but I used Rome2Rio.com to take a look at options. The SAVDA bus company seems to have a daily departure from Chamonix to Courmayer. After a 20-minute layover you can get an onward bus to Aosta. After a 1-hour layover you can pick up a bus to Torino. That whole trip takes 4-1/2 hours and leaves you well south of your target destination. I wonder whether there are car-rental opportunities in either Courmayer or Aosta. I suggest checking that.

I've also taken a look at the train connections, and other than Milan (where you might need to taxi between two rail stations), I think they're all in small towns where you may not need to do more than walk across the platform. If you're not over-burdened with luggage, it should be totally manageable, but until she has done it, your wife will probably be nervous about it.

Have you checked the details for the night train you're proposing to take? Be sure you don't have a middle-of-the-night connection to make, lots of jarring stops, or a very early arrival that will leave you cooling your heels in Dijon for hours before anything is open.

Darren,
I've visited Chamonix and Varenna, but not on the same trip.

Keep in mind that you'll be spending several hours on the days you travel to/ from Italy.
I'd much rather spend those two days enjoying some place in France than sitting on a train or a bus trying to get to Italy (and back to France).

I'd suggest limiting your trip to France which has many beautiful regions to explore.

If you want to visit a lake, you could travel to Annecy (from Chamonix), then head over to Provence.

Wishing you a wonderful trip!

Where else are you going in Italy? Which areas of France do you want to visit?

We could help better if we knew your proposed itinerary.

Rather than hopping back and forth between countries, why not do one, then connect to the other.

Yes, on a bet I don't think I could find 2 locations harder to get between than what you picked.

Climb onto the bus from Chamonix (I think it leaves from the train station) and enjoy the slightly claustrophobic trip through the Mont Blanc Tunnel. Keep telling yourself that it has stood for a number of years and probably won't collapse today. Get off the bus at Courmayeur (end of the line) and have a coffee or ice cream and wait for the bus to Aosta. Go white-knuckled down the windy road and marvel at the Italian Alps. In Aosta, most of the buses end up at the train station. From there, buy a ticket to Milan and then to Lago Como. If you really want to rent a car, I would suggest Milan might be a better bet than trying to rent in Aosta. I've done all of this except the stretch from Milan to Como, but I hear it is easy.

Back again! Sorry for the delay, I had an unplanned shoulder surgery that put me out for a bit.

To answer a few questions that are asked to us: In France, we'll be based in Burgundy. This is our annual summer destination (and Christmas at times, as well) so that's where we'll spend the bulk of our time in France on the tail end of our trip. We also would like to spend some time in Italy since it's been a few years since we've been there and my youngest daughter hasn't ever been there.
We're flying to geneva first since we scored flights there for all 4 of us four just over $1000, which was about 25% the cost of flying into italy. We can rent a car in Geneva and drive to Chamonix for a few nights, then off to Varenna in about 3 1/2 hours but as I said, it's a little pricey so I was just probing to see if anyone had better options. Sounds like we're coming up empty, though.
I'm not concerned about the drive time since it can easily be broken up with a lunch break in Italy making the two legs quite manageable. It's the price that I'm trying to get around but maybe that's unavoidable. I appreciate the help!

If you get a car on the Swiss side of Geneva airport, it will come with a Swiss vignette. From Chamonix to Varenna, you could go over the pass to Martigny, then up the Rhone Valley and over the Simplon Pass into Italy. Now if you were willing to settle for some place on Lake Maggiore like Canobbio, or Stresa, you would be there by now.

Darren,

That's actually not as difficult a trip as you might imagine. In the same situation, this is what I'd do.....

• Take one of the Chamonix Shuttles from your hotel to the main station in Geneva. An early morning departure would be best, but I'm not sure how early they start operating. You'd have to pre-book the shuttle.
• Travel by train from Geneva to Milano Centrale and then to Varenna. For example, there's a direct EC train departing Geneva at 07:39, arriving Milan at 11:37 (time 3H:58M). Another easy one would be a departure at 12:00, arriving Milan at 16:37 (time 4H:37M, one change in Brig).

I just researched trains to Milano Centrale. Once you're there, it's easy to connect with trains to Varenna-Esino, which is only a trip of 1H:03M. There are departures to Varenna at 12:20, 13:20, 14:20, 14:25 (2 changes), 16:20, 17:20 and 18:20 (1 change). There are others.

If you want to use a shuttle, I believe THIS is the one I used. I was very pleased with their service and would definitely use them again. There are lots of others.

If you were to rent a car, keep in mind the need for each driver to have an I.D.P. dealing with ZTL areas in Italy (you might want to read some of the recent posts on the forum on that topic) and highway tax vignettes in some countries, tolls, high fuel costs, etc. You'll also need an I.D.P. for driving in France or a certified translation of the terms of your D.L. in French.

Ken, thanks for the help, it was really helpful. We had found that shuttle and train idea and considered it. However, since there are 4 of us traveling, we realized that if we picked up a car in Geneva (French side) then traveled to Chamonix from there, then off to the lake district (which is actually about the same timewise as the train) and then off to the rest of our italian itinerary it actually saves us quite a bit of money. We're nixing the night train and just keeping the car and driving on our way to France, dropping the car in France as we fly home at the end of our trip. By going this way we decided to break up our last day on the way from Italy to France so we don't have a super long drive and the entire 3 week rental is about $200 vs the cost of 2 rentals, drop offs, and a train which was significantly more expensive (almost $1500).

So, I appreciate everyone's help on the matter as I think that it helped us get to where we are and the family is pretty happy and looking forward to the trip!

Darren,

There's only one of me, so public transit is usually the most cost effective option.

As you're going to be using a rental car, I'm assuming you've researched the usual "caveats"....

• as mentioned above, each driver listed on the rental form will require an International Driver's Permit which is used in conjunction with the home D.L. That's true for both France and Italy.
• In Italy you'll need to be extremely vigilant to avoid the ZTL (limited traffic) areas which exist in many towns & cities. Do NOT drive in Florence as the city is just about saturated with automated ZTL cameras! There have been some recent posts about hefty fines received while driving in Italy, so something to keep in mind.
• In Italy you'll also have to be careful not to drive in Bus lanes and watch the speed limit, especially on highways covered by the devious Traffic Tutor system.
• Be sure to budget for tolls.
• If you're renting the car in Switzerland, it will likely already have the Swiss Highway Tax Vignette, but be sure to check that.

Thanks, Ken. We've driven in Italy many times, so I indeed have learned (sometimes the hard way...) the law of the land down there. I already have my IDP set up and ready to go for both countries. We're excited to get over there, so it will be a long few weeks!