Train or fly from Florence to Rome to catch flight back to Vancouver Canada leaving at 12:25pm

diane,

It would be absurd to fly from Florence to Rome, since that's one of the easiest trips to do on high speed rail. It will also likely be cheaper by train, if you buy advance purchase discounted tickets. If travelling by train, you'd likely be in Rome before the flight departed from Florence! There's a direct departure from Firenze SM Novella to Rome / FCO at 07:38, arriving at 09:52 (time 2H:14M).

Is the flight departing from Rome direct to Vancouver, or does it stop at another airport in Europe (ie: FRA)?

If you have not booked the trans-Atlantic tickets yet, you can consider a multi-city itinerary: Fly into Rome, fly home from Florence. The flight west will probably involve changing planes at a European gateway city, not necessarily Rome. For instance, WestJet combines with KLM/Delta on these routes so you might change in Amsterdam. The website you use will set it all up. The multi-destination ticket will cost a little bit more, but save both the time and expense of returning to Rome and will conveniently check your luggage straight through to Vancouver. You can see the possibilities at www.itasoftware.com although it doesn't sell tickets.

Ken,

We already booked the round trip to Rome several months ago because we wanted to spend a few days in Rome before heading up to Florence for a weeks stay in the area. I didn't think there was a direct train from Florence to the FCO airport. That you had to go to termini station then transfer to the Leonardo express into the airport. My concern is them getting there in time to check in, go through passport control and get to the gate. The return flight connects in Toronto, then on to Vancouver.

If you make reservations how far in advance do you need to book? We are leaving out of Vanvouver next weds am, and the kids fly back out of Rome on Sat June 4th, so it is getting pretty close.

There are only one or two trains per day that take you direct to Rome FCO airport from Florence and beyond, but that's all you need here. If you book train tickets now, they can pay 40 euros each instead of the full 2nd-class fare of 54.

diane,

Thanks for the additional information. As your flight is an international flight, you'll have to be at the airport a bit earlier that for a flight within Europe. The train arriving at 09:52 will give you about 2.5 hours, so that should be adequate (although I'll defer to the collective wisdom of the forum on that point).

If you want to use the 07:38 departure from Firenze SM Novella, it would be a good idea to book the tickets soon, as the prices will only increase. I just checked and there are still some Super Economy tickets available for €39.90 (first class) or Economy at the same price (second class). You can purchase the tickets either on the Trenitalia website or at www.captaintrain.com (same price but Captain Train website is more user friendly). You can print the tickets prior to travel, which makes it easy. With those trains you don't actually need printed tickets, only the PNR number (but I always like to have a "hard copy").

Changing trains at Roma Termini is not really a huge problem. If you'd rather take an earlier train to allow a bit more of a "cushion" prior to your return flight, the important thing to remember is that locally purchased tickets for the Leonardo Express MUST be validated prior to boarding the train on the day of travel.

Hopefully you don't have any delays with your connection at YYZ (that's not one of my favourite airports).

The song by Rush is much better than the airport!