First trip to Italy!

Since you will likely arrive at Rome FCO in the morning or early afternoon, I would take immediately the train from the Rome airport to Florence (likely train change at Roma Termini station, Rome’s main station, although there are a couple of trains departing from the airport that require no change). The journey time from Roma Termini to Florence is 96 min. Front the Fiumicino airport station to Termini is 32 min. There are trains every 30 min or less from the airport. There are 4 trains per hour to Dlorence from Rome, until very late in the evening.

Wish you had posted prior to purchasing your airline tickets. I would have encouraged you to fly into Venice and home from Rome -- probably cheaper and more efficient use of time. You should always look at open-jaw tickets (multi-city). The decision to drop Amalfi coast is smart. Save Naples and Amalfi for next year. On arrival I would take the train to Venice. Your arrival day is always shot riding to Venice is OK. You will sleep most of the way.

I didn't see anything about total time. I try to three nights in Venice, another three in Florence or two in Milan on the way to Venice. And then balance of your time in Rome. Through the TI in Florence you could get a wine tasting tour or rent a car for a day to hit a couple of the better wineries around Florence. The wineries require a reservation and a fee.

After that it depends on time in Rome, lots of day tour options from Rome.

Florence deserves 3 nights (assuming no additional day trips to Tuscan towns).

Florence to Venice by train takes 2h10min. I generally recommend 3 nights in Venice, but I’m not sure you have enough nights for that, since you should try to spend the last 4 nights in Rome (or at least the last 3 nights for barely see some major Roman sights).

The train journey from Venice back to Rome (via Bologna and Florence) takes 4 hours. No changes are necessary for many cases, although some may require a change at Bologna).

Two train companies to choose from (the latter operates only high speed trains to major cities, including Rome, Florence, Venice):
www.trenitalia.com
www.Italotreno.it

Italian station names are:
FIUMICINO AEROPORTO
ROMA TERMINI
ROMA TIBURTINA
FIRENZE SANTA MARIA NOVELLA
BOLOGNA CENTRALE
VENEZIA SANTA LUCIA

11 nights

Fly to Rome
Go immediately to Florence
Florence 4 nights
Gives you 3 full days and allows for a day trip if you’d like -Siena or Lucca or take a guided van tour of Tuscan hilltowns/wineries

Train to Venice
Venice 3 nights

Train to Rome
Rome 4 nights-I’d consider this bare minimum here

Fly home from Rome

Given the 'lemons' of in/out of Rome and your desired locations, I believe Christine has made the best 'lemonade' one could make with what is available.

Have you explored what it would cost to re-book the flights , in to Venice, home from Rome? Any additional cost would be offset by the cost of one way of train tickets from Venice to Rome, plus give you at least a half day more being somewhere and not just riding a train.

thank you to those of you who really frowned on the fact that we were flying in and out of Rome. When I originally booked the airfare I was not giving thought to a multi city round trip and was pricing 2 one ways in different cities......the one way from NY to Venice in that scenario was more than our round trip NY-Rome so we went with roundtrip NY Rome. Now that I looked into, we changed to fly into Venice and out of Rome. It ended up costing a little more but we felt it was worth it!!!!

Assuming it is not possible or practical to change your flight to make it to VCE and return from FCO, I suggest you buy your train ticket to Florence when you arrive and not prepurchase online. You could save up to 50% by purchasing online ahead, but it’s hard to predict whether your flight will be timely. If you do, make sure you give yourselves several hours of leeway, just in case. Discounted tickets cannot be changed or refunded, and any tickets will become null and void after the train has departed.

The tickets from Florence to Venice and from Venice back to Rome, could be however safely be purchased at a discount ahead of time, since in that case you won’t be coming via airplane and so you can safely predict when you can be at the station on time to take the train you booked.

Oh! That is excellent!

I’d still divide your 11 nights as I proposed
Venice 3
Florence 4 with 1 day trip
Rome 4

My last comment was superseded by events, since you now have a multicity flight. You could potentially buy tickets ahead of time if you want to save time.

Cristine has a good allocation of days. I had not noticed you were staying 11 nights.