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Travel from Cinque Terre to Matera

We will have two days in our October trip to travel from Manrola to our bike tour in start in Matera. Trying to figure out how to best use that time and get that far efficiently? Thinking of taking train to stay overnight in Pisa and fly down? Any suggestions would be great!

Posted by
1147 posts

Hello

It looks like Ryan Air flies directly from Pisa to Bari in October and Volotea (who I've never heard) of flies from Florence to Bari according to Kayak. There's a bus from Bari airport to Matera although quick searching only shows one a day in the evening so a transfer to Bari central train station and then a bus to Matera is probably the best answer. There is a train (not run by Trenitalia) but it is slower than the bus and can require a transfer.

Here is a page about getting to Matera from Bari: https://www.amoitaly.com/matera/access.html

Assuming any of these flight times work for you this will be the fastest way that I can think of. Otherwise you're looking at getting to Florence and then fast train to Naples (3 hours), and then a regional train and then a bus to Matera. I'd guess about 7 hours or so if this all lines up.

What day of the weeks you have to travel on may affect the schedules of flights, trains and buses between weekend and weekday. Both Florence and Pisa airports are easy to reach from the city so which flights work for you should probably dictate your plan.
Whether you want to do it all in one day or get partway one day and finish the next is up to you, but however you do it you will be spending a chunk of time travelling.

Have a great trip,
=Tod

Posted by
28249 posts

There are potentially a lot of moving parts required for this transfer. I'd want to get a lot closer than Pisa on the first day with a tour hanging in the balance, but I'm very conservative about such matters.

Posted by
3812 posts

I'd fly from Pisa to Bari and visit the city before taking a bus to Matera. But you must trust RyanAir! Or take a train to Genoa, see it and fly to Bari via Rome with Ita Airways.

Another option would be via Florence and Salerno "on the ground". Have you already been in either? Trenitalia sells combo tickets, you take a direct high speed train to Salerno in the morning and then a bus to Matera.

Unfortunately the all trip takes 7 hours, and spending the last 3 on a bus on a mountain motorway... I'd rather break the trip in Salerno, since you have two days. Miccolis runs direct buses departing in the afternoon from Salerno's Montpellier Square.

Posted by
47 posts

One way may be to fly Pisa to Bari (Ryanair) and then take a bus to Matera. Taxi over to Bari Centrale; check the bus schedule out of Bari Centrale to Matera, the bus trip is about one hour. Idk if you've ever been to Matera but if you haven't you might want to leave a day early to spend some time there; the ancient part of the city is really amazing.

Posted by
295 posts

I can't see the whole thing taking much less than 12 hours from hotel to hotel without flying. I generally avoid flying, but in this case, I'd either settle in for a long train journey two days in a row with a nice little stopover or do just as you say and fly from Pisa (or check to see if flights from Genoa are more desirable. Similar train travel time and it won't add significantly to your flight time.)

If you want to get really granular, you could check flight stats to see whether the flights you've chosen have more historic delays than others; but with Ryan, I would leave my optional exploring on the back end (Bari) instead of seeing Genoa or Pisa and cutting it close. To be fair, I've flown with Ryan about 10 times and I haven't had a flight canceled. Not one of them boarded precisely on time, but around half of them made up the time in the air and arrived precisely on time. 2 were late enough (over an hour- nearly 3 hours) to cause minor headaches.

Posted by
3 posts

I'm so impressed with the advice I was given on this question, thank you I have a few options now to consider.

Posted by
17563 posts

What time is the meet-up for your tour? Most “active”tours we have taken (for hiking, not cycling), meet in the evening on Day 1 to give everyone time to arrive from the US, and then they head out for a full day of activity the next morning.

Flying from Pisa to Bari may not save you much time, given the travel time to the Pisa airport and the extra 2 hours you need to allow for check-in, security, etc. And the flight time may not line up at all with the timing of the train or bus from Bari to Matera. You may well have to overnight in Bari. Which is OK ( I can suggest a nice convenient place to stay, right close to the train station).

But I will suggest a variation of Dario’s “on the ground” Salerno route for your consideration. Trenitalia operates a FrecciaLink from Salerno to Matera, taking 3 hours. It can only be booked in combination with a ticket to Salerno on a Frecce train. Dario suggested starting that in Florence, but you can also start in Rome or Naples ( Roma Termini or Napoli Centrale) to go straight to Salerno. That would shorten the journey on the second day.

Whatever you choose, you have to start with a regional train from Manarola to La Spezia. From there you take the train to either Rome or Naples for an overnight. Next day you take a Frecce train to Salerno, arriving there in time to catch the FL015 bus departure at 14:26. For example, depart Rome at 12:00 on FR 9519, arriving there at 14:06. Or depart Napoli at 13:25 on the same FR9519.

Trenitalia will offer you the right connection and sell you the ticket for the train-bus combination if you enter “Roma” (or Napoli) as the starting point and Matera (not Matera CLE) as the end point.