Italy by train

Have you compared prices with the rates at trenitalia.com. Italiarail is a North American travel agency specializing in selling Italian train ticket. There has to be a fee in there somewhere.

just for fun, i looked at this site. i agree with joseph it seems easy to use (although i find trenitalia site easy also). unlike raileurope, it does seem to show all the trains / same info as trenitalia. prices seemed the same as trenitalia except for a slight conversion markup (a few dollars per ticket) and a $5 processing charge. also, for tickets not wholly within italy, looks like they mail you the tix for an extra fee instead of being able to print them yourself in the station. seems like a decent option if for some reason not comfortable with trenitalia site, although i always figure unless there's a good reason, why not buy directly from the source.

Joseph, You might also consider buying tickets after you arrive in Italy. It's very easy to do, either at the staffed ticket offices or from the Kiosks. Happy travels!

I was in Rome during the Tiburtina station fire, and it did mess things up! Trenitalia has offices in most major train stations (Customer Care centers) and they will also sell you tickets. By the way, second class on the faster trains does have assigned seating (Freccia Rosa, Freccia Argento, etc.); these trains are more expensive but save a lot of time.

If you buy tickets from the trenitalia site you can qualify for discounts up to 60% off with the mini fares. I'm not use if italiarail can book these tickets for you. I, personally, think it's best to use the official seller when possible. I always book my train tickets through trenitalia and not any of the re-sellers. Donna

When something is too easy, we pause and wonder if there is a "catch" or assume we must be making a mistake. I find it humorous because I can relate! I've never used Trenitalia's website before last week and it was easy and very straightforward. I did look at the schedules and reviewed my itinerary a thousand times before making the purchase. I am locked in to "mini pass" fares, which suits my travel style and my itinerary which is "fixed", but the benefit was saving a nice amount of money on the five tickets. Purchasing on their website was as easy as anything I have ever purchased online and I had no problems with my credit card, but I did call Capital One beforehand so that it wouldn't get referred to their fraud department. Just remember, first class is assigned seating in somewhat nicer coaches and second class is open seating. Many posters will suggest that first class isn't worth the extra money, but that is a personal decision and only you know your comfort level and budget when you travel.

Just returned from a 15 day trip to Italy and traveled exclusively by train: Milan to Stresa on Lake Maggiore, Milan to Pisa, Pisa to Lucca, Pisa to Siena, and Siena to Rome. The kiosks are extremely easy to use. English is an easily found option. To mitigate any problems with credit cards we used a Travelex card with pin and chip. When using the kiosks just be aware of people hanging about offering you "help." They are there so just be aware. We traveled on everything from Eurostar first class trains to pokey one-car regional trains. My impressions (we have been to Italy before traveling by train) is that the trains are just a bit more crowded (some of the regionals were standing room only!), the lines at the kiosks just a bit longer than usual, and the overall level of service a bit down. But, it certainly beats driving and is still a pleasant experience. A bit of chaos is expected. We had planned to travel from Rome Termini to Orvieto for the day, got to the station, purchased our tickets at the kiosk, and were waiting for our track to be posted on the boards. Five minutes before our train was scheduled to leave, it was cancelled and we had to wait on line for close to two hours for a refund on our tickets. Only later did we find out that there was a fire in Rome Tiburtina (the station to the north of Termini) and all trains to the north were cancelled. There hadn't been any announcements in the station that mentioned the fire. If there had been, we never would have purchased tickets. But such is Italy. But overall, I would recommend buying tickets as needed from the kiosks and for longer trips consider first class.

I fretted over buying tics once in Italy....couldn't have been easier using the staffed windows at the stations or a local TA. Typically we purchased a day or two before we wanted to travel but there were several trips that were same day purchase. I am glad we didn't purchase before we left the states.

@ chris, I am curious as to why you are glad you didn't purchase your tickets in the States?

The only benefit to not purchasing your tickets before you leave is that you can travel at the spur of the moment. You can easily walk into a train station and buy tickets for the next train available without being locked into a rigid schedule. The benefit to buying ahead of time is the discounts you can take advantage of. Most people already have their itinerary, know which cities they'll be in on certain days and have their hotels booked which is why booking online is such a great idea. If you prefer not to be locked into a certain time of day for travel then you should just wait and buy when in Italy. Donna

Does anyone know if there is a day ticket on the coastal trains? We are traveling the coast to Rome and would love to hop off and on when we stop someplace we want to see. The delema is we don't know where that would be since it is our first trip.

Technically speaking, any ticket on a regional train is a day ticket. Once validated in the yellow box the ticket is good in one direction for 24 hours So you can get on and off on any regional train going to your final destination. You would need a second ticket to return to Rome but the regional tickets are cheap. All other Italian trains require a seat reservation so you would need a new reservation each time you got back on.