Rail Travel in Italy

You'll take the Leonardo Express from FCO to Roma Termini, then transfer to a fast Eurostar to Milan. Current price is 105 for 2nd class, 130 euro for 1st. Takes about 4 hours. Many folks find 2nd class to be more than adequate. Some folks like 1st, say more room. For your route, point to point tickets will probably be cheaper. Remember that with a railpass, you need to add a 10 euro mandatory seat reservation to each Eurostar segment. suggest you do Milan first then end your trip in Rome.

We bought tickets as we needed them usually, but sometimes the night before at a tourist info spot, which will save time if you're on a tight schedule. We only bought first class tix once; there didn't seem to be any more room, or luggage space, than second class on the train we were on. seemed a waste of money to us! The only thing I cannot stress enough is to be SURE to validate your ticket before you get on the train!! These are the little time-clock-looking things that are all over the train stations, inside and out. Many are yellow, some are red. BE SURE to put one end of your ticket in the slot so it can time-stamp it!! Failure to do so will result in a big fine that you must pay to the conductor right on the spot when he/she checks your ticket. We did this once, on our first day in Italy, and got a 50 euro per person fine! Fortunately I had plenty of euros with me; unfortunately, that conductor didn't want to discuss the matter; just wanted the money. It was fortunate that I'd read about train fines in Rick's "Italy" book and knew to go ahead and pay the conductor right then; otherwise I'd've thought we were getting scammed! (we were really tired, and forgot to validate our third-of-the-day ticket...)
Good luck, and have fun!

You only need to validate an open ticket -- unreserved. If you have a reserved seat on a specific train -- no need to validate because that ticket is only good for that train. Other than the regional/local trains all the other trains require reservations so you only validate on the regionals.

Erin, To supplement the info you already received... Ron has given you great directions on the routes you will have to take. To help you further, you might read these articles: Arriving at FCO will walk you through the process of arriving at the Leonardo Da Vinci Airport - with plenty of pictures! The FCO train station article will give you directions to the train station, again, with pictures. It will also give you the scoop on where you can get tickets to the Leonardo Express. If you've already got train tickets to Milan - great. If not, you can use the Trenitalia counter, as shown in the pictures. Or you can use one of the kioks to purchase your tickets. DO validate your Leonardo Express ticket before you get on the train! Then, your next step is arriving at Roma Termini Station. You'll come in at satellite platform, Track 25, and have to walk 8-12 minutes to the main part of the station to catch your AV train to Milan. There is always a big debate about which class of ticket to buy. GAC writes a great article, with plenty of photos, that can help you decide: 1st Class or 2nd Class tickets? No need for a railpass. You can save a ton of money if you buy tickets in advance, but this is a tad risky if your flight is late. I might only buy my Milan- Florence and Florence - Rome tickets in advance... and get the Milan-Rome tickets at the FCO train station. Look at this article: the Trenitalia MINI promotion which can save you up to 70%, rendering a rail pass less viable. MINI ticket allotments are controlled by Trenitalia. (continued in next post)

If you do want to buy tickets in advance, and more and more folks are reporting their US credit cards working (Hooray!), then you should read this article for some assistance on understanding the Trenitalia website and the ticket purchaing process: Booking on the Trenitalia Website . The last part of this article introduces the Le Frecce section of the Trenitalia website... where you can actually seats by number - much more advanced than the other booking processes on Trenitalia. If you want to ride the fastest trains to your three destinations, you might page down, read that, and book from that segment of the website. And lastly, for a summation, Riding Trains in Italy is a good start if you've not used the train system in Italy. Hope those help you - Good Luck!

Thank you so much for you help! I really appreciate it! :)