Should we get train tickets for Italy in the US ?

If your itinerary is etched in stone, and you're absolutely sure the dates you will be traveling by train, absolutely buy them here, as far in advance as possible, as it will be quite a bit cheaper. You can go the trenitalia website to purchase. I don't remember the exact spelling for the website, but it's easy to find on Google. I'm willing to bet someone on here will give it to you soon!

Trenitalia.com would be the place to purchase tickets--at a discount if you buy them ahead of time.
You'll be looking to go from Roma Termini to La Spezia on a fast train with reservations. But you'll be locked into those reservations so your plans will not be able to be changed.
From La Spezia, you catch a local train into the C/T.

limar,

Where were you planning to purchase the tickets? It is possible to buy them without a processing fee at either the Trenitalia website or at www.capitainetrain.com (there is another site, www.italiarail.com but I believe they charge a fee).

A bit of additional information would help. When is this tour taking place? If you can book well in advance (up to 120 days in advance), significant savings are possible and that's a good reason to pre-purchase tickets. However, you MUST be willing to commit to a specific train, date and departure time, as some of the trains have compulsory seat reservations. Be careful to board ONLY the one train listed on your ticket, as boarding any other train will likely result in hefty fines, which will be collected on the spot!

Many of the local trains in the Cinque Terre are Regionale and no reservations are possible for those. Buy tickets from local stations (ie: in Rome) and then just validate prior to boarding the train on the day of travel. DON'T forget to validate or again you'll risk hefty fines!

If you need advice on the quickest trains from Rome to the Cinque Terre, post another note. It would help to know which of the five towns you're planning to stay in?

Thank you for all the good input.
We will traveling the third week of September, taking a train from Rome to Monterosso. We do plan to travel on a specific date as we have already made hotel reservations in Monterosso.
A travel agent has been helping us with other reservations, (airplane, hotels) and he suggested that there is a mailing fee, but perhaps this is his fee for taking care of it for us.

limar,

You can easily make the train reservations yourself. The group here tend to be more knowledgeable about that particular subject than most travel agents, and there's absolutely no reason to pay a fee for someone to do that.

If you could indicate the time and date that you want to travel from Rome to Monterosso, I can offer some suggestions.

We are doing this exact same trip in October. After Rome we are spending two night in Monterosso. I purchased our train tickets on the Trenitalia website 120 days before our trip. It was really easy. Like a PP stated you are buying tickets for "Roma Termini to La Spezia Centrale", there will be a time table that pops up with the time for each journey and the price. Pick the one that looks good (I chose one with no connections). Chose your seats and pay. You will get an email with your actual tickets that will have your PRN number and a barcode. The website will ask you if you want to register, I did not and it was fine.

Once you get to La Spezia Centrale you can purchase a regional train ticket to Monterosso. Buying the train tickets has been the most stressful part for me because I want to make sure I am purchasing for the right Point A to the right Point B. I am also going from Monterosso to Florence. On the Trenitalia website Florence is "Firenze S. M. Novella" (there are 10 stops that start with "Firenze"!), I would only know that searching websites such as these and asking questions from my fellow travelers.

And you don't need to wait until you get to La Spezia to buy those Regionale tickets.

You can get them from any attended window at a station or from any machine. Just switch it to English and follow the instructions. Don't let "helpers" help you. They are valid for a long time until used which is why the Regionale tickets MUST be validated in the green/gray machines.

Thank you for the specifics on what train station to leave out of Rome. We would like to get to Monterosso by dinner time, leaving Rome on Sept 20th. Is it worth it to get 1st class tickets?
Also - I assume we can also get tickets ahead of time for our return from Monterosso to Genoa to catch our flight home on 9/23.
I think we want to try to get this taken care of before we go to Italy.

I took the train from La Spezia to Rome a couple of weeks ago and it was about a 3 hour trip. I believe that I had a 1:15 PM train and I landed at my hotel in Rome (via taxi from the train station) by 5:00 PM. I had started at the train station in Monterosso at about 11:30 AM so it was about a 5 1/2 hour journey total with some extra time in La Spezia that I didn't need.

I purchased a first class ticket from La Spezia to Rome ticket ahead of time since it wasn't that much more expensive and then just purchased the regional ticket at the train station. Be aware that if you have a lot of luggage, there is no lift at the Monterosso train station and you will most likely have to walk to your hotel as taxis are hard to come by.

P.S. - This is off the original subject but I highly recommend the Hotel Villa Steno in Monterosso. It is a beautiful property and everyone who works there is super friendly and helpful. It is on a hill so there are some steps to get there but it is well worth it as the views from both the hotel terrace and room balconies are amazing!

My experience with travel agencies is that they tend to use other travel agencies such as Rail Europe for their tickets. Can often pay fees to both travel agencies for the same ticket that you can buy on-line at deep discount if earlier enough. Getting tickets, making reservation, etc., via the internet is very easy and often cheaper than using an agent. For the most part, I rarely view first class as being much of an improvement. Nothing like the airlines. The standard seat on the train is more like business class as to size and room.

llmar-since we have never taken an Italian Train I splurged and purchased first class. It might be a lesson learned or we may just be so comfortable my Husband will think I am the travel planning queen. It was about 20€ more each, so not that much. Plus it is a longer trip. It does not appear that there are class designations for the Regional trains.

I booked first class tickets on my two longer train legs in Italy for my trip last month. It was about $10 more than the regular fare ((booking way ahead of time) and probably worth about that much - maybe slightly better than coach but not that much. All of the trains that I took in Italy were pretty comfortable and there were plenty of empty seats available. Either way you go, it's all good!

limar,

As Sept. 20 is a Sunday, there may not be as many trains running, but still easily possible to get to Monterosso. This is what I'd suggest.....

• Buy advance tickets for FrecciaBianca 9772 which departs Roma Termini at 11:57, arriving La Spezia Centrale at 15:37 (time 3H:40M, direct with no changes). You might find it easier to buy from www.capitainetrain.com as it's more "user friendly" than the Trenitalia website (but either one will work). It appears that pricing has moved up to the Economy level so I'd suggest buying SOON, especially as there will be six in your group (you may have to sit separately, depending on availability).
• A few days before you'll be travelling, buy Regionale tickets from La Spezia Centrale to Monterosso either at a staffed ticket window at Roma Termini (usually a LONG queue) or at a Kiosk (don't let "helpers" interfere with your purchase).
• When you arrive at La Spezia Centrale, you have a 19 minute layover. At this time, validate (time & date stamp) your Regionale tickets in the machines (which may be in the transfer tunnels). Your train to Monterosso will likely be waiting on the platform. Verify the train number and other details on the electronic display and then board your train (if you're not sure it's the correct train, ask an official). The ride to Monterosso will be 24 minutes and I'd suggest sitting on the left side (when facing forward) as that will provide the best ocean views.

Are you clear on the route to your hotel when you arrive in Monterosso? If you need any information on that, post another note.

Ken and all
thank you for all the great info. We booked our train tickets - good thing you told us about traveling on a Sunday - We missed getting the cheapest fares as they were already gone, but did get reasonable prices.

Any tips on our trip from Monterosso to Genoa? We go to Genoa to fly back to the states.

One note I will make is when booking Italian train tickets in advance, print out everything: starting with the itinerary you get from Trenitalia when booking. After the payment has been accepted, you should receive a separate EMail from Trenitalia with the subject line 'Your Trenitalia Ticket', which has the actual ticket as an attachment with that square barcode thing,which is what the conductor scans when making his rounds during the trip. Make sure you print that out, because that's the real ticket. You will probably have to do this for each separate leg or return trip.

If you are in total fail-safe mode, it's probably not a bad idea to scan each ticket printout as a .pdf & save it to your smartphone. We didn't have to use it, but had we lost our sheaf of hard copies of all our travel arrangements and confirmations, we could've used the scans as a backup. A total peace of mind thing.