Transportation from Portland Oregon to the Boot- Milan-Venice-Montepulciano

To get from Amsterdam to Venice, fly.If it's Milan to Venice, take a train.Venice to Rome, train.Rome to Montepulciano, take a train from Rome to Orvieto, then rent a car in Orvieto.

billie,

Check with a Travel Agent or one of the online sites for the best flight options from PDX to whichever location you'd like to start at in Europe.

It would help to have a bit more detail about your travel plans. I'm assuming you want to stay in Amsterdam for a few days, then head for Milan and the other destinations in Italy.

Travel by rail is easily your best option. Having a rental car is appropriate for some situations, but you'll need the compulsory International Driver's Permit to drive in Italy, and also be careful not to pass through any ZTL areas (€100+ violation ticket EACH TIME you pass one of the automated cameras). There's information here on the HelpLine regarding what to look for.

As you'll need a car for the Villa at Montepulciano, you might want to rent in a nearby location and then return the car before you head for Rome. Booking your return flight from Rome would be the best option (a practice known as "open jaw flights"). You might want to visit Montepulciano after Venice and before Rome.

If this is your first trip to Europe, I'd highly recommend pre-reading Europe Through The Back Door before you get too far in your planning. The book provides a lot of great information.

Happy travels!

We plan to do a similar itinerary next year, from Seattle.

I suggest open jaw tickets, flying into Amsterdam (KLM flies nonstop from Seattle to Amsterdam) and departing from Rome when you're all done. You can get a separate one way ticket on the local Dutch airline Transavia to fly from Amsterdam nonstop into Verona (for about 120 euros, depending on the day - they call one-way tickets "single journey" on their website). Then buy tickets for the train from Verona into Venice once you land in Verona.

Then train from Venice to Rome when you're ready.

Here's the transavia site: http://www.transavia.com/hv/en-EU/home

Sister PDXer - On May 29 we are flying PDX-Atlanta-Venice via Delta. After your stay in Venice, perhaps you could rent a car (not sure where - airport?) and drive to Montepulciano. At the end of that villa stay, you could maybe drive to Orvieto, drop the car and take the train into Rome. I can't speak from personal experience until after the end of June, but this is what others have suggested. When are you going? (FYI - Amsterdam is a delightful place to visit if you're looking to do that for a couple of days. I choose that over Milan and then you will experience two different cultures on your trip.) ~ Kay from The Original Vancouver, USA

Continental has a great flight from Portland to Milan. You change planes in Newark and then fly direct to Milan. It arrives between 8 or 9 in the morning Milan time, so you can sleep on the way over and have minimal jet lag.

Thanks to allfor your helpful advice! Decided to fly from pdx to milan. Will need to decide the rest of this trip in the next 3 weeks! Great to have options but am thinking I will need to plan my return trip immediately upon my return home! So much I want to do and see in a lifetime! Thanks again! b