Questions about trains and Italy

1.You will almost certainly save money by purchasing Super Economy tickets online 120 days in advance. Sometimes you can get the tickets for not much more than the $15 reservation fee you'll have to pay with your pass.
2. Pisa is not on the high speed rail route between Rome and Florence. I don't see the CT in your itinerary. If you are staying in Rome for 6 nights on arrival, then going to Florence, just park your bags at your Florence hotel, then proceed to Pisa on the regional train for the day. No reservations needed or available. 3. Strikes, by their nature are unpredictable, but predictable enough that there is some advance notice and some service available.

Cheaper to get point to point train tickets and you may be able to get some
of the super cheap tickets purchased in advance -- per the post above.

To get the lowest discount fares on long distance high-speed trains, book ASAP (up to 120 days allowed) on trenitalia.com. Rome-Venice: Super Economy fare of €29.00. Venice-Florence: Super Economy fare of €19.00. Florence-Naples: Super Economy fare of €29.00. Naples-Rome: Super Economy fare of €19.00. That's a total of €96.00 ($130.00 US). Florence to Pisa and return on regional trains: €7.90 each way. No discount fares.

Julie, As the others have mentioned, pre-purchase of tickets for the premium trains is usually the cheapest option. However, keep in mind that the tickets are specific for a particular train, date and departure time. Choose your travel details carefully as once purchased, you'll be "locked into" travelling at the time specified on the ticket. A Railpass if rarely a cost effective method for travel in Italy. Where did you get details on a cost of $15 for reservations, and where were you going to buy the Pass? Reservations typically cost about €10 PP per trip, so $15 for all the trips you'll be taking seems a bit low. If you decide to use P-P tickets, your trips to Pisa and the Cinque Terre will likely be on Regionale trains. You MUST validate those tickets prior to boarding the trains on the day of travel, or risk hefty fines which will be collected on the spot! The same fines apply to those travelling on the premium trains without having valid reservations, and also for travel on Buses. I don't know how often strikes occur, but they typically only last for a day or so, and there will always be some transportation provided. Strikes are always announced in advance, so you'll have to check closer to when your trip takes place. As someone else mentioned, the C.T. is not shown on your Itinerary. Are you planning to do that as a day trip? Good luck with your planning!

Considering the itinerary, it would have been better to purchase a plane ticket from LAX to VCE then return from Rome FCO back to LAX.

Thanks all for the replies. Now I'm really confused!! So to add a couple of comments, the airline tickets are already bought. I see now that people say it would have been better to fly into one city and out another, but that's a done deal now! With respect to the trains, when I go to EuroRail and try to see the prices via point to point or using a rail pass, I'm coming up with the exact same price no matter which way I go! Our accommodations are also already set, so here's a more detail itinerary: 3/29: Fly into Rome and somehow get from airport to airbnb apartment near the coliseum 4/4: Train to Venice 4/7: Train to Florence 4/9: Train to Cinque Terre (day trip) 4/11: Train to Naples 4/14: Train back to Rome Airport to fly out We are staying at all airbnb places and they all give really good instructions on how to get from the train/airport to the apartment/homes, so I'm not too concerned about that. It's just that an Italy Rail Pass can be bought for $187/person right now for 4 days plus $15 per leg. So I think it would be $247 for the four days of travel on 4/4, 4/7, 4/11 and 4/14 not including the Cinque Terre train day and not including training from Rome central to airport on Monday. And looking at the costs on RailEurope, point to point for the exact same trip would be exactly the same amount ($247)! The one difference I can see are the trains. The rail pass would be on Trenitalia (La Frecce) and the point to point would be on Italo. There's a little more flexiblity on travel times with Trenitalia, but we could travel first class on Italo for the same price. So do I choose flexibility with La Frecce or first class with Italo? Again our dates are set, so just the times that day are flexible. Thanks!
Julie

Julie, the problem is that you seem to keep looking at RailEurope for both the rail pricing and the point-to-point pricing. RailEurope will not show you the discounted pricing listed by Tim above. You must be on www.trenitalia.com to see these discounted prices. Also, you won't be able to see them on Trenitalia until after mid-December with Trenitalia refreshes their schedule and fares for the next six months. You seem to have a very fixed travel plan. This is very good if you want to buy the heavily-discounted point-to-point train fares. They are non-refundable and non-exchangeable. You will be on a specific train on a specific date and you will depart at a specific time. Many travelers cannot do this but since you already have a very good schedule, you can. We do it all the time in our travels. As a side note, what time is your flight out of Rome? The train to the airport doesn't begin running until just before 6:00am. Many flights out of Rome require that you arrive at the airport much earlier for the early flights out.

Thank you Larry for your response! You are right that I've been looking at RailEurope, so I'll play around with Trenitalia website and fudge on the dates to get an idea. Our flight out of Rome doesn't leave until 8:45pm, so we're good there I think. Thanks again Larry. I'll let everyone know what I find!

What exactly is the difference between Economy and Super Economy? Is it just whether you can get a refund or not? It looks like point to point are significantly cheaper and we won't have to put out the money until early 2014. Thanks for answering my questions everyone!!

Deep breaths, Julie. First, you don't have to use RailEurope for your passes, should you wind up after all this help getting passes, the website here, Rick Steves, also sell them and give you lots of extra bonus. You definitely want to put Rail Europe out of your mind as far as looking at point to point travel In Italy. They don't show you all the possible trains, they mark up the tickets that they do sell and don't show you discounted ones (so the low figures given by Tim won't make sense to you) and when we tell you otherwise that can be very confusing. The prices given by Tim are easily achievable if you plan ahead at the opening of the buying window. I have no idea about the prices of the passes so I'll use your figures. Part of the problem can be trying to think in two simultaneous currencies so I'll look at it all in euro, and then convert the difference to dollars at the end. You can get to Roma Termini from the airport by train then taxi or bus or metro to wherever your hotel or taxi all the way, whatever, so I won't include that in the calculations. So, using the Pass. 4 days for $187 = €138 = €34.50 plus €10 mandatory reservations per Freccia leg and €3 per InterCity reservation per leg and no extra charge for Regionale - per day Train to Venice €10 Train to Florence €10 Train to Cinque Terre (day trip) Regionale trains but if you are on an InterCity from Pisa to La Spezia you need the reservations, both ways? 4/11: Train to Naples - Freccia all the way to Napoli €10
4/14: Train back to Rome Airport to fly out - we need to talk about that in a minute. Freccia reservation to Roma €10 At least €138 plus at least €40 = at least €178 per person with the pass. I will see the point to point in the continuation to this message. ... cont...

... more ... So, point to point, €111.80 all together including the (no charge) reservations on the fast trains, and back and forth to the Cinque Terre, plus to and from the airport. Using Super Economy, or .Italo Treno equivalent, saves you €66 per person or about $90 for the two of you. BUT - its not quite that simple, so another couple of things - The pass gets you first class seats, the Super Economy figures are for (absolutely sufficient, as good a s flying business class) second class seats. With the pass you are prohibited from using .Italo Treno trains, using point to point you can use either as you wish. The prices are roughly comparable, if you want to spend a few extra euro you can travel in first if you like. Both the Freccia and .Italo have various levels of first class, to suit your needs. SO, Julie, you need to tell us your needs. You may find that getting in line and buying reservations on top of your pass costs fits your lifestyle better, or you may find that printing out all your tickets at home and saving money fits you better. There is no one size fits all travel. Stay away from Rail Europe and we will try to make your journey easier. I see from your later post that your flight from Rome is in the evening. It may work to take an early train from Naples, change to the Leonardo Express in Rome and still fairly easily get to the airport a good 3 hours ahead. I'd leave at least one train fudge time each leg for a calm heart. So plan on worst case, that you just missed your LE to the airport and have to wait a full hour, and add an hour to the Napoli-Roma leg and you can have a nice dinner at the airport. Happy travels

Yes I am definitely sold on getting point to point tickets over the passes and I'm so happy for everyone's responses. I was so close to buying the passes, but now I see the light! I will probably purchase in advance and print the tickets at home. There are actually 8 of us traveling together (mostly my in-laws and my dad). My last question (hopefully). I thought someone had stated that I could buy point to point 120 days in advance, but Trenitalia looks to be 60 days or 2 months in advance. Am I missing something or is it 2 months in advance? Thanks!
Julie

Julie, I'm the one who said you can book tickets 120 days in advance for freccia (high-speed) trains on trenitalia.com. However, there are train timetable updates twice/year throughout Europe. The next update will take effect on 15 December and will be good until June. Until Trenitalia uploads its new timetables, you can't book tickets beyond 14 December. Trenitalia is notoriously slow in posting its new timetables so just keep checking the site and book at the first opportunity to do so. The only difference between Economy and Super Economy tickets is the price. Both tickets are for a specific departure date and time and are non-exchangeable and non-refundable. There is an allotted number of Super Economy tickets for each departure time. When they're gone, you can book Economy tickets. When they're gone, you pay the base (standard) fare.

Perfect Tim, thanks for explaining that! I think I finally have a handle on how the train tickets work thanks to everyone on the board. Julie