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Need help; Italy train information inaccessible

Dumbfounded in Canada; here is my question: ARE THERE ANY TRAINS TO VARAZZE, Italy: (Italian Riviera little coastal town) AFTER 10:00pm FROM MILAN LINATE OR MALPENSA AIRPORT on a WEDNESDAY???? And we just love your guidebooks.

Posted by
11457 posts

Yes, there are many trains, from Milano Centrale or Milano Porta Garibaldi, the main train stations. Use https://www.trenitalia.com/en.html for planning. Looks like one change of train in most options with direct trains twice a day.

Edit: just saw the “after 10 pm”. Nothing that late, sorry. Spend a night in central Milan then go at your leisure.

Posted by
16765 posts

No, there are not. You have to first get from either airport to Milano Centrale. From there you can take a regional train to Varazze, but the last direct train leaves at 20:25. There is a later departure to Genoa at 21:10, but then you have to connect to a bus to Varazze, a the overall journey time is more than 4 hours.

Your best option is to overnight near Milano Centrale and take the direct regional train departing at 8:30 the next morning. Or one of the many other departures with a connection in Genoa.

Use Trenitalia.com to see the schedules.

https://www.trenitalia.com/

Posted by
4174 posts

Just a gentle reminder ... the Forums do not go directly to Rick Steves or any of his employees. We're just other travelers here that try to help each other.

As for your direct question, according to TrenItalia, there is no direct route from Malpensa Aeroporto to Varazze. The first leg of the journey is to get to Milano Centrale. Here's info on the last and only train from the airport to downtown using Wednesday 5 June (05/06/2024) as a test date.

22:37 Malpensa Aeroporto T2.

0h 58m.

Train number: 10388.

REG (Regionale).

23:35 Milan Centrale.

$ 14.40 1 adult.

Continuing on, this is the earliest, fastest and cheapest option from Milano Centrale to Varazze with no train change on my test day of Thursday, 06/06/2024.

08:30 Milan Centrale.

3h 6m.

Train number: 3017.

RV (Regionale Veloce) Faster because they skip some stations.

11:36 Varazze.

$ 17.77 1 adult.

Here's the link to TrenItalia so you can explore for yourself and make reservations if you find a schedule that will work for you. https://italiatren.com/en

By the way, if you arrive too late to catch that last train to Milano Centrale, there are some decent hotels at MXP. If you can catch that last train, there are some nice hotels just a couple of blocks away from Milano Centrale. I've stayed at the Hotel Berna (just 200 meters from the train station). They have a great breakfast. https://hotelberna.com/en/hotel/

If you decide to stay there, be sure to ask them about food availability after 23:30. You may need to get something at the train station if that's possible. I got room service one night there, but it wasn't anywhere near that late.

If you end up staying at one of the airport hotels, the same question will apply, with the default maybe being airport options before you check in.

Finally, I see this is your first posting. If you've only used RS books, you might want to explore the Travel Tips part of this website. It's great for learning things you didn't know you need to know.