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Travel options Milan to Lucca (and back again)

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We're going to Italy March 18th through 28th to visit family in Lucca. Flying in and out of Milan (arriving at 1pm) and looking at my options for travel. We will be renting a car for travel around Lucca, since our group is 6 strong and the family there doesn't have a big enough car. My original thought was taking a train from MXP to Pisa and picking a rental up in Pisa once we arrived. That travel time is looking to be around 5 hours and rentals aren't exactly cheap during that time frame in Pisa, plus the cost of the train tickets.

Next option is MXP to Florence, then grabbing the rental there and driving to Lucca, which doesn't really cut that much time off and doesn't save that much money.

The final option is rental car at MXP and drive to Lucca. Doesn't look like a terrible drive on the map - this would be the cheaper option and give us the most flexibility.

John

Posted by
3812 posts

Doesn't look like a terrible drive on the map

If the map shows the mountains and that's ok for you after a long flight... why not?

The drive from MXP to Florence takes 3h and 40 minutes plus stops, by train it takes 3 hours and 30. Not a big difference.

Posted by
9 posts

Dario -
Thanks - and I guess that was my concern - the drive after the flight. I don't suffer terribly from jet-lag on my trips over to Europe and the mountain roads can't be any worse than what I've driven through in West Virginia. My only real concern would be the weather and road conditions at the end of March.

John

Posted by
3812 posts

Since it seems spring now, I doubt you have to worry about the weather in March.

Be aware of the speed traps on the A1.

Posted by
15874 posts

What mountain roads are we talking about?
From Malpensa to Lucca the trip is entirely on a multilane freeway similar to any Interstate in the US.
You will drive mostly on the very flat and straight A1 freeway (6 to 8 lane freeway) from Milan to Parma Ovest exit. At Parma Ovest you switch to the A15 freeway, a 4 lane freeway that goes through the Cisa Pass on the Appenines mountains, but even that stretch has only few soft curves because it is mostly on the Taro valley and on the Magra Valley. In between the two valleys, where the Cisa Pass is, the designers of the freeway killed all the fun, and tunneled (or built viaducts) through the mountains, therefore the freeway will be just as flat and straight, just underground or on viaducts. The drive itself is not difficult at all of course, and in the unlikely event of snow on the Cisa pass the freeway is too low in altitude (and underground) to be affected. March is also too late in the season for snow events on that pass.
To me the only problem is the excruciatingly boring drive, especially before you start seeing some mountains. The chances of falling asleep at the wheel are very high, at least for me. When I drive from Milan to Bologna on the A1 I just wish I had a self driving Tesla and go to sleep.

Posted by
9 posts

| To me the only problem is the excruciatingly boring drive, especially before you start seeing some mountains.

Ha. You've never driven I71 between Cincinnati and Cleveland, have you?

As for 'Mountain Roads' - I was talking about the A1 and A15, so yeah, not really 'roads'.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I appreciate it.

John

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