Questions about transport booking/payment for trip end of Oct. (Venice/Florence/side trips)

Booking a discounted ticket on the day of arrival is very risky. Those tickets are non refundable and non changeable and flight snafus happen. The full price (“base” price) on standard class from Venezia Mestre to Firenze Santa Maria Novella is 57€ pp one way. That price will not increase between now and when you travel. Booking in advance now for October saves over 50% over that price, but if your flight arrives late (or is cancelled) and you miss the train you book, your ticket is worthless. So weigh the risks. If you decide to buy ahead, give yourself many hours of buffer. If you don’t want to take the risk and can afford the full 57€ pp, then no worries, just buy the ticket when you walk into the VE. Mestre station.

You can buy tickets at tobacconist shops with any means, or pay on board with credit card or phone virtually everywhere in Tuscany, where buses are operated by AT (Autolinee Toscane). I would still carry some cash for minor purchases, bathroom tips, tips. Carry about 50-100€ on you, just in case.

Re phone in the US I have T-Mobile (Magenta plan), which is German owned (Deutsch Telekom). TMobile does not charge extra while roaming abroad, so you get 5 Gb of data plus unlimited text messages while abroad. However US calls cost $0.25/min. But if you call Italian numbers it will cost more because it will be treated like a an international long distance call made from the US.

I also have an Italian SIM card in my old iPhone 8, which still works beautifully in spite the advanced age. It is with Vodafone, they give you 500gb at 5g where available, for almost nothing, so I use it more than my T-Mobile with my US phone. A local SIM is useful if I make local calls to Italy, which otherwise would cost a lot from my US phone. But if I use the phone for data only the 5Gb a month TMobile gives me would be more than sufficient.

The largest Italian mobile operators with their own networks (MNO) are (in order of size): TIM, Vodafone, WindTre, Iliad.

There are also virtual operators (MNVO) that roam using the above networks. They are: PosteMobile, FasWeb, VeryMobile, HoMobile, CoopMobile, KenaMobile, Spusu, and others.

Mobile phone plans are super cheap compared to what available in the US, so choose whichever you wish. TIM and Vodafone and WindTre have a lot of stores where you can buy their plans.

Adding to Roberto's good advice:

• If you're flying into Venice Marco Polo airport you'll need to get a bus or taxi to Venice Mestre train station.
• The only transit pass you might be interested in is a vaporetto (water bus) pass for Venice. They are expensive for 1-2 days but actually become a decent value for longer stays. Always validate your pass every time you use it. Also you can get the bus to the airport by adding a fee to your valid vaporetto pass for when you head to the airport.
• You can also buy eSIMs for your phone that generally give you phone data but no phone number or calling. This will allow you to do email, maps and chat and call one another with WhatsApp or Signal or whatever you want to us. It's often helpful for one person to make calls - say dinner reservations - but maybe not everyone needs a full physical SIM. They are much cheaper and don't require a visit to a cell phone store.
• Get the Trenitalia phone app for checking schedules and buying tickets.
• Even in October I would book big sites ahead of time in both Florence and Venice to avoid standing in ticket lines.
• Both cities are small and very walkable so you may take buses less than you are thinking.

Enjoy - both cities are fantastic,
=Tod

before flying out the same airport (couldn't find plane tickets where flying one way out of each airport wasn't vastly more $ than going in and out the same one.

Did you look at the "multi-city" ( aka 'open jaw) option or simply one way tickets.

Usually multi-city tickets are quite close in price to a round trip. Especially when the cost of backtracking to the starting point is factored in.

Perhaps too late to change tickets for this trip, but may be something to consider for future trips.

Phone service
Who is your provider now?

@Roberto da Firenze Thanks I'll keep that in mind for the train tickets.

@hiredman Good to know about booing tickets sooner for lines. Thanks..

@joe32F I did not any multi city option any where I looked when trying to find flights, just one way and round trip. Probably is too late to change, not sure, I don't think what I booked through United is refundable. But will at least keep that in mind for the future.
Phone: I am on T-Mobile and on an old plan that got carried over from another provider they acquired so not sure what I'm allowed in regard to out of country service with that. Also to those who mentioned esim the phones we have don't' support it from what we've read.

UAL makes it harder than most other airlines to find "multi city"

It is hiding in the 'Advanced search", which is below the ticket class box on the 1st booking page

Advanced search
(Certificates, multi-city and upgrades)

https://www.united.com/en/us

Thanks! That'll make planning soo much easier in the future.

Oof ok yea could saved 600$ on that with the multicity option (and had an additional layover). Glad I at least know for next time I need that kind of thing..

United’s tickets are usually changeable without a fee-just cost difference if there is any and flight credit if less

Not sure if a change would help you
There won’t be any direct flights out of Florence
( Rome and Milan will have direct)

Yea I've been looking at that since the last post. I can change the flight. If I swap the first trip so we fly into Florence instead of flying into Venice and taking trains to Florence and then heading back midway through the trip.. Flying into Florence to start will be 600$ cheaper + the savings of not paying train tickets from Venice to Florence. Effects of that: one additional layover to worry about things going wrong on with flight delays; our first point of entry to the EU would be on that extra layover so getting through security checks would make things tighter if there's a delay or whatever airport we'd be in for that is slow at moving people along, looks like it would be a 2hr layover in Brussels (with the current trip we fly from home airport to Newark and then straight to Venice the make the trip south); Would also be meeting up with the one group member later as they are not flying and would be coming from up north so they still have to take the train from Venice down to Florence.. few less hours or so together sucks since we don't see each other enough, but not a major con and depending on their transport options they may wind up needing to leave the day before and get there sooner anyway.

So just need to discus with the group about the layover thing. I was happy for our nice one layover in Newark then straight to Italy flight simplicity but.. that's a nice chunk of money that could be saved.

our first point of entry to the EU would be on that extra layover so
getting through security checks would make things tighter if there's a
delay or whatever airport we'd be in for that is slow at moving people
along, looks like it would be a 2hr layover in Brussels

United runs this connection daily. If lots of travelers miss their connecting flights they’d be in trouble ;)
They are responsible for getting you to Venice. Your luggage (if checked) will be checked through to Venice. A 2 hour layover is a good amount of time. You will stay airside in Brussels.
IF stuff happens- United will put you on the next flight to Venice with availability.

If you can save that much by changing flights I wouldn’t worry about missing the connection.

flying into Mestre/Venice area,

Where do you plan on staying? Venice ( I hope) or Mestre?

Do you need help with trains? Let us know.

True... I'll likely make the change. Just been in burn out mode while trip planning so the extra layover to deal with felt more uhg than it normally would. But logic and $ frugalness will win out.

We are staying on the main land in Mestre not in Venice. Due to some needs of our group we have gone with renting an apartment rather than hotels and everything in Venice itself that was affordable an had enough beds/was otherwise suitable that we could find was booked.

Plan was 5 nights in Florence and the rest of the trip up there in Mestre to see Venice and do day trips a few places not far off.

If you have TMobile already check their plans. I have Magenta 55+. It’s $50 per line ($45 with autopay discount). Now they might have new deals, I think now they have an plans called “Experience” but that is the ballpark of what they charge for unlimited plans with plenty of perks, including 5Gb of international data.