2 days to get from Rome to Venice

How long are you going to be in Rome before the 19th? If you're there for several nights already, I would suggest two nights in Florence. It's 1 1/2 hours on the train from Rome and you can get Super Economy tickets for 9 euros each right now. It's then an easy train ride to Venice with similar cheap tickets available. Whatever you do, don't fly. If you decide to train from Rome to Venice you can get train tickets for 29 Euros each using the Super Economy fare. (You have to buy them in advance online.) And it takes less than 4 hours. Flying would take longer than that due to the airport hassles. And get the RS Italy book if you don't have it already. Best money you'll spend. Happy travels.

My guess is that it would be a pretty challenging drive anyway. I doubt it would leave you with much time to explore; you'd be spending most of your time driving (particularly since you can't typically park within old town areas, so you'd be finding parking and then figuring out how to get in). You should be able to find quite inexpensive train tickets, particularly with advance purchase; where were you looking? Why not pick one town that interests you and spend a couple of days there? I've not been to Urbino (some day...). But either Assisi or Ravenna would be enjoyable in 2-day visits. They are quite different, so the choice would depend on your interests. Assisi is a better preserved town with wonderful art and it's great for wandering; but the mosaics in Ravenna and Classe are amazing. Either would be an easy train ride (direct from Rome to Assisi; you'd probably make one or two transfers to get from Rome to Ravenna). Orvieto is also a really lovely town, about an hour outside of Rome by train: beautiful cathedral, Etruscan ruins, interesting town to wander around, and apparently good wine.

Thanks for the responses so far. -We're arriving in Rome and planning to leave immediately since we'll be back that way in October -Because we're in so many big cities, I was hoping to see some of the smaller towns (as opposed to Florence) -I used the ItaliaRail website, but wasn't able to bring up prices for tickets this far out. The one site I found had Rome-Assisi for $16 but Assisi-Venice $73.
That's more than triple the price of the Easyjet Rome-Venice flight, which we've used effortlessly before. I understand we can get the direct train tickets for about the same price as flying, but it seems so much easier to get the plane schedules than train schedules and prices!

A couple of thoughts. First, it will cost you 14E each to come into the Rome Termini station from the airport on the Leonardo Express. Or, since you would like to go to Assisi, you could take the train from the Fiumicino Aeroporto train station to the Roma Tiburtina train station for 8E. Now you are in Rome. From Rome-Tiburtina to Assisi takes about 2.5 hours. Fares range from 9.40E to 12.90E depending on the train run. Assisi to Venice will be a 5.0+hr journey. You will change trains in Florence and possibly Bologna as well. The orginary fare ranges from 36.65E to 54.85E again depending on the train run. For the higher fare, you will be on a Frecciargento high-speed from Florence to Venice. Right now, I can see and buy the tickets from Assisi to Venice. I can also see the Super Economy fares of 20.85Euro for Sept 19 if you are willing to accept a non-exchangeable and non-refundable ticket for a specific train on a specific date at a specific travel time. With some planning and possibly help from this site, you can get from FCO to Rome, to Assisi and to Venice for under 40E. You won't beat this on a budget airline. As a side note, Assisi is our favorite hilltown. If you query the site, the favorite hilltown would probably be Orvietto but ours is Assisi.

Have you checked the prices on the Trenitalia website?

So you're landing at FCO and could hop on another plane while still at the airport? That could indeed make flying a quicker option, although those Super Economy fares are amazing, when available. No flight will beat them. But they have to be booked through trenitalia.com, not some other site. If you want a hilltop town experience, Assisi is beautiful, if a bit hard to get to. Orvieto is easier from Rome, but then it's five hours to get to Venice, I believe. That's the catch with the hilltop towns: Because they're smaller, they're not major transportation centers.

I can resolve the Assisi v. Orvieto competition, since I've been to both. I can definitely say ........ They're both great! Pics from our trips to Orvieto in May 2011 and Assisi in May 2008. If you were to try to make me choose between the two, I would refuse. :-) Orvieto does have a slight edge over Assisi for accessibility by train.