Transportation from Rome to Venice

Buy the train ticket from Rome to Venice well in advance to get one of the cheap fares before the sell out.

But there's no need to buy local bus tickets in advance. I forget how the bus system works in Rome - haven't been there in years, but it's not something I would worry about until I got there. Use Google Maps to tell you which buses to take - that's what I always do. There's a public transit option when you get directions between two places. Change "Leave Now" to "Depart at" to avoid finding buses for the middle of the night, if you are checking times now when it is the middle of the night in Rome.

You are there now, correct? Ask at the hotel front desk which bus to take, or how much it will be to take a taxi. (I’d guess about €15.) If you buy your train ticket I’m advance it may be cheaper than buying it the same day at Termini. All you need is to show the PNR code from an online purchase to the capotreno on board the train.

Meant to add, you will need bus tickets before boarding the bus. The hotel can tell you where to buy them nearby, but every new stand and Tabac shop will have them,

Its a bit over a mile from the hotel to the station. I might be tempted to walk and get one last view of the Trevi Fountain. The walk would make sitting on the train a bit more welcome.

Weather in April should be ideal for a walk

Annette,

My suggestion would be to ask your hotel to arrange a Taxi to Roma Termini, as that will be the easiest solution when hauling luggage. Buy your train tickets online either from Trenitalia or Italo Treno (whichever one has the best price). Note that tickets are specific to train, date and departure time, so you must use the train listed on the ticket. You'll have compulsory seat reservations, and your ticket will specify your Coach no. (Carrozza) and your Seat no.'s (Posti).

2 people + suitcases = taxi. Simple arithmetic. Taxis are not expensive and it's a short ride. No fuss, no mess, no wrong turns, no hauling bags on and off a bus that may be crowded.

Thank-you all for you suggestions! This really helps! I think we will probably arrange for a taxi when we're there in April. We going to Venice, then Florence, Siena and then back to Rome before we go home. So I assume I'll get all my train tickets on line now and transportation to the train stations when we're there.

Florence to Siena is a Regionale so no bonus for buying ahead. Many take the bus on that route, instead of the train. I took the train and drove but see the advantage to the bus.

While there is no money savings to buying Regionale tickets in advance, if you can keep to a schedule it is a major convenience to already have them and not have to deal with purchasing tickets while trying to catch your transit. Plus, part of these routes may be on the high-speed line that does require the advance reservation. For example, we have this spring Rome-> Siena, Siena-> Ravenna, and Ravenna-> Venice. We are taking the bus to Siena as it arrives in the center and is quicker, for Siena to Ravenna, we will take the bus to Florence and the train then includes the high-speed before a transferr in Bologna. We opted not to double-back to Bologna to again get the high-speed to Venice both for schedule and savings. This entire package purchase last week cost all of $68 each (counting the Siena-Florence bus ticket which can not yet be purchased).

I am buying all our train tickets at once, from Rome-Venice, Venice-Florence, Florence-Siena, Rome-Airport. For our transportation from Siena to Rome, we're going by bus instead of train. We'll be traveling on April 23rd, after Easter. I was told that's a holiday week, so would you advise me to get our bus tickets now? I'm inclined to do that, just to have them for my own schedule.

Also, on another note, I saw an ad on the rail website for a Vatican & Colosseum Show & Go Pass for $230 (Per person?) Does anyone have any experience with this? It looked pretty good to me, assuming we would be able to use it BEFORE we go to Venice, of course. A friend said we should definitely do a tour at the Vatican versus on our own, as we would get in to see things we would not get to see on our own.

Here are the official sites for tickets to the Colosseum and Vatican Museum. They both have tours you can book along withe your skip the line ticket. These are much more reasonable then the show and go.

https://www.coopculture.it/en/colosseo-e-shop.cfm

https://biglietteriamusei.vatican.va/musei/tickets/do

If you're there on a Friday evening, do the Vatican entry then. It's much less crowded.

Annette-

Thanks for asking this question. We are heading from Rome to Venice also and now that everything is planned, we need to get this taken care of.

Have fun!

As others have said, the Google Maps public transit option works well. We used it quite a bit in Rome a few months ago.

And, yes, buy your train ticket in advance.

When lugging luggage about, I prefer to take a taxi. Once we've dumped our suitcases in our hotel or apartment, public transit it great.
Traveling to/from airports and train stations with luggage, I opt for a taxi.

ashane, you say "the rail website", but don't specify which one.
You should be looking on Trenitalia, which is the company that runs the trains: https://www.trenitalia.com/tcom-en
Other sites are resellers and may have markups and/or not sell all trains.

If you haven't bought train tickets yet, I would beg you to reconsider your Florence to Siena plans. I have taken both the train and the bus. The train station is not nearly as convenient and will require a long walk to get to where you want to be or a taxi.
The bus drops you in town in Siena.
I prefer to spend my vacation cash on experiences, not a taxi that could be avoided.
It REALLY is more convenient to travel between Florence and Siena by bus.

Thank-you, but I have already bought my train ticket from Florence to Siena. The hotel did tell me the best way to get to them is by taxi. I am going to go to Rome from Siena by bus, however. I have not bought that ticket yet as I haven't decided what time I want to go. I don't want to get to Rome at night and then try to find our hotel, but I also don't want to go during the heavy commuting times either, which I assume will be in the morning. But the more expensive tickets are late morning and early afternoon.