I have a flight out of Florence on Thursday July 2 at 12 noon. We will have spent a week at villa near Fiesole, then plan on 3 nights in the Cinque Terre and hoped to spend our last 2 nights in Lucca. We don't need to spend more time in Florence at the end of the trip, since I expect we'll have been there several days and evenings already, and I'd rather not have any one night hotel stays if I can avoid it. So my question is whether you think it's feasible to take the train from Lucca to Florence the morning of departure, then a bus or cab to the airport from SM Novella. There are no train schedules this far in advance, but it looks like there are several trains an hour, and the trip is between 1:18 - 1:50 depending on the train. Two adults and two teens, each with a carry on sized bag.
Thanks for any advice.
Posted by
San Francisco Bay Area (USA)
16243 posts
There are also buses (VAI bus) that travel from Lucca to Florence, and the first bus stop at the freeway exit is at the Florence airport.
http://www.lucca.cttnord.it/Linee_e_Orari/Linee_Extraurbane/L/95
Select Linea: E01 (Firenze-Lucca-Viareggio-Forte dei Marmi-Carrara)
for: AEROPORTO DI PERETOLA
Download the PDF file.
One hour and you are there at the airport
In any case, if you want to take the train, the schedule won't change between now and July.
The taxi ride from Florence SMN to the airport is about 15-20 min (for 20 euro). Just make sure you are at the airport at least one hour prior to flight departure. So if you arrive at SMN by 10am, you have time to make it easily.
Posted by
Basel, Switzerland
8889 posts
"There are no train schedules this far in advance" - Train times only change twice a year. The main big change is second Sunday in December, this is the big annual change. Plus some companies add extra summer trains from June/July to September/October.
Train company websites only allow bookings 2-3 months in advance, so the websites sometimes give an error if you request times ahead of this, but the timetables are already fixed and have been since last year.
So if there is currently "several trains an hour," you can be 99% certain this will apply for the rest of the year, and until further notice.
Posted by
Green Bay
21398 posts
There is an R002 bus that goes every 15 minutes from Lucca to Florence that stops at Peratola Airport. Journey takes about 1 hr 10 min.
Posted by
OP
Pittsburgh, PA
28 posts
Thanks so much, all. Sam, the bus sounds like the best option. I appreciate the information.
Cheers,
Rachel
Posted by
Green Bay
21398 posts
Looking over the schedule, the buses aren't quite as frequent as I first thought, but still plenty of deprtures in the morning Mon-Sat. 6:25, 6:45, 7:30, 8:55.