Drive from Venice to La Spezia through Siena?

Have you mapped it? Viamichelin is a great website for route planning.
Siena is much further south, so I think I would rethink the plan. It's four hours Venice to La Spezia just by freeway.

Sorry to say, but that sounds exceedingly unrealistic. You'll turn a 4 hour drive into a 6 1/2 hour drive and suffer through a great deal of traffic and local roads. Just the drive from Bologna to Florence over the mountains on a heavily travelled autostrada will negate memories of pretty scenery. Italy has plenty of enjoyable scenery in addition to Tuscany. The route to La Spezia from Parma over the Cisa Pass of the Apuan Alps is quite pretty. I suggest you stop along the way and enjoy a small city close to a direct route such as Manua or Castel'lArquato. https://www.marthasitaly.com/articles/173/castell-arquato-travel-guide

You also might rethink why you are getting a car just for Venice to La Spezia since the car is of no use in Cinque Terre.

You're talking about driving at least 2 hours out of your way to spend about an hour, at most, in Siena and getting to your night's lodging in La Spezia probably well after dark and worn out. I wouldn't recommend it but, of course, it's possible if you want to put yourself through that. I wouldn't drive that way unless you were to spend the night in Siena before heading to La Spezia.

If you're going to drive, I would drive the Via Michelin recommended route through Bologna (stop for lunch and a quick look around the old center) and then through Parma. Not the rural beauty of Tuscany that you're probably looking for, but much more practical and still interesting.

Tell us more about your plans and we can make suggestions. It's not Tuscan hill country, but just south of La Spezia there is a lovely drive around the Montemarcello peninsula for example.

Luvahunt,
I agree with the above advice about viamichelin. I'd also Compare the time needed to drive from Venice to LaSpezia via Siena with an high speed train from Venice to Florence followed by a drive to LaSpezia.

Be aware about the ZTLs in all the city you mentioned, including Bologna and Florence. You should not leave anything in the trunk, there is an high risk of theft from cars parked near the sites crowded with tourists.

I'm curious, are you really staying in LaSpezia? Will you drop the rental car in LaSpezia or will you pay to leave it parked somewhere?

Just the curvy drive

Curvy? When did you last drive on the A1 between Bologna and Florence?

The suggestions are so very helpful. Although it might be putting a damper on my plans, these are the things I needed to know ahead to make better plans!

As to answer your questions, the reason we are getting a car for this leg of our trip is 1. So that we could have a chance to explore some of the Tuscan countryside and 2. Because we are needing a car for several days in Sardinia and it would just be easier to get it a couple days early and ferry over so that we could have a chance to see some countryside off the beaten path.

We have Read that we won’t need a car in Cinque Terre, which is why we are staying in La Spezia and then just taking the quick train over to Cinque Terre for a day trip, back to our place in La Spezia and then we hit our ferry .

So it looks like my options are to add a one night stay in Siena to make it worth it, or try the via Michele instead and still see some countryside although not as beautiful?

We weren’t going to do Florence this trip so that’s why was trying to find another beautiful task in town that I’ve always wanted to see you and we chose Siena. If there any other road trip places to stop on the way to La Spezia that would be better or make more sense I’m up for ideas!

I also considered taking the train from Venice to Siena and then take the Siena train to La Spezia, but I read somewhere that we wouldn’t really enjoy the countryside if we took the train. That we needed a car and Siena if we actually wanted to see the countryside. Do you find that to be true?

It is sad to me that in order to see the scenery from a car on a highway you are sacrificing staying in the villages of the Cinque Terre choosing instead to stay nearby in La Spezia which my experience tells me is the opposite of beautiful.

I would have just waited to get the car when I arrive in Sardinia.
Or you could drive somewhere in Tuscany like what you actually want, and skip CT--it is really crowded and you will be seeing so much beautiful scenery in Sardinia anyway.

There are a few rental companies that do not allow their cars to be loaded on ferries, you'd better check.

Taking a car on the ferry is quite expensive and they are easily rented in Sardinia. If you train to La Spezia, you can take a train to Livorno for the ferry or you can fly Ryan air from Pisa to Sardinia. You could satisfy your Tuscan scenery desire easily from Pisa or Livorno before or after. If you've not committed to accommodations yet you can also fly Easy Jet direct from Venice to Sardinia.

Mike...are you saying if we took a train from La Spezia or CT to Pisa for the airport or Livorno for the ferry that we would see a lot of beautiful Tuscan countryside? We can still see that from the train? I would be willing to wait until sardinia to rent our car but only if we still had some sort of opportunity to see Tuscan country. We have a full day 8am to dark to get from Venice to The CT area and just thought it would be out onlh Chance to see Tuscany but didn’t think we could see that by train.

No, I meant you could rent a car from Pisa or Livorno and drive to the Chianti Classico part of Tuscany known for the 'classic' scenery with rolling brown hills, and lanes lined with cypress trees. The Tuscan scenery along the train line from La Spezia to Pisa/Livorno is first of the dramatic Apuan Alps including the Carrara quarries and then of the flat coastal plain.

Hi Mike, that sounds like it might be a great idea. What route/road would you recommend to drive from La Spezia to Livorno to be able to see a little of the Chianti Classico?