Traveling from Rome to Venice

Here's one great source of information:

https://www.seat61.com/international-trains/trains-from-Rome.htm

(Choose "Venice" from the drop-down menu at the top of the page)

It would probably be cheaper and more convenient to fly into Venice and come home from Rome. But train travel between the two is easy. I think it is little less than five hours with 1 or 2 trains per hour.

There are fast direct trains with both Italy and Trenitalia. But if you want to spend a couple of days on the journey, possible overnight stops are Orvieto and Bologna, among others.

The train is an easy, fast, direct train. You have two basic options, buy through the national rail company, Trenitalia https://www.trenitalia.com/en.html or buy from the independent Italo https://www.italotreno.com/en

Tickets are cheapest bought well ahead, but you commit to a day and time. When searching, the station in Rome is Roma Termini (Roma Tiburtina works as well) and the destination is Venezia Santa Lucia. Journey takes around four hours.

Spending a day or two in Rome makes good sense. Flying round trip to Rome is fine, in many itineraries, flying into Venice means stops or a delay in getting to Venice, and leaving from Venice usually means a difficult to get to early flight.

Even leaving from Rome, I would try for no earlier than a 10:00 AM departure.

From the DC area Dulles to Rome can be a direct flight... Venice has required me to change in Brussels, or Frankfort or Amsterdam..The train is fast and easy, but as said, book ahead. Shouldn't be a problem since you will already be in Rome so scheduling the departure should be easy enough.

Not sure why you prefer RT to Rome. Care to share your rationale?
We did the Rome RT on our first trip to Italy, and found ourselves exhausted on the train, but not comfortable enough to sleep. Seemed like prolonged jet lag hell.
Note that one first must get from the airport to Rome Termini train station, ( about an hour, ) wait, and then board the train to Venice, 4+ hours. It's not a particularly scenic train ride. I wouldn't buy tickets in advance, in the very real chance that your flight is delayed. To me, this hassle is not worth a direct flight from the USA.
Options could be to fly into Milan or Venice, then out of Rome. These multicity , open Jaw flights (all on the same ticket) generally are about the same price as RT.

Again, we tried that once, and wouldn't repeat.
Safe travels.

You won’t find any direct flights to Venice from DC Area
There are United flights that take you to Newark form IAD to catch the direct flight to Venice ( that is not a horrible choice)
American does have direct flights to/ from Venice from Philly if you are willing to drive a bit.
( we are about equal distance to IAD and PHL so we have used both)

I’m assuming you just don’t want a plane change on the way?
Make sure you are looking for “multi city” or open jaw- usually under Advanced Search
Not 2 one way tickets

That tour gives very little time to both Rome and Venice so adding time before and after makes sense- for that reason I would probably start in Venice- easier to fly IN to, great place to get over jet lag, Rome can be chaotic - are you first time visitors to Italy?

As noted above- fast trains are easy, affordable and comfortable

Book MultiCity Tickets - fly into Venice and out of Rome.

I see that United has nonstops from Dulles into Venice and return from Rome beginning at least by the first RS Tour in May.

Ah
Sam is correct
I forgot about seasonal flights
I guess we always travel earlier in April

Thank you everyone! What a wonderful forum this is. Lots to chew on. To answer a few of your questions: We’re in our 70s, so we prefer nonstop flights from Dulles because connections can be stressful and we’d rather not have to start off by traveling to another city here. We’ve been to Italy before, including Venice and Rome, and happy to have extra time in either locale. Looking at a mid-September RS “Best of Italy” active tour.

My wife and I are doing the same thing in March. We are going on the RS Venice / Florence/ Rome 10 day tour. We're planning on visiting Rome for four days prior and taking the train to Venice to start the tour. The cost of a multi city ticket and flying back home after March 15th doubled the cost so we are going to Rome before the tour starts.
The question I have is there is a train that leaves early in the morning from Rome. It says it's four hour on average and arrives in Venice around noon. We need to meet our tour at 4 pm for our first introductions and a first walking tour.
Do you think one can take the train from Rome to Venice, get to the hotel in the middle of Venice and then meet the group at 4 PM?

Just checking a random day early March shows first train 5:35 then about every 30 min

Trenitalia
https://www.trenitalia.com/content/tcom/en.html
Station names
Roma Termini
Venezia S Lucia

However I would want to get to Venice at least the day before-you’d hate to miss start of tour and the tour doesn’t give you enough time in Venice (IMO)

hey hey elissacl
so many options for you to look at. we have done multi-city flights (not 2 one way tickets) so you don't have to backtrack and the cost of backtracking.
remember when flying to city your check in time is between 2p-4p unless you get early check in or book room night before and let hotel know what you're planning and check out is 10-11am. we had big issues waiting 6 hours to check into apartment at 1pm when we landed at 8am in london. learned our lesson.
the train from roma termini to venice (venezia santa lucia) is 4+ hours. use the italian names for train cities. we would leave late morning, buy a lunch (picnic basket) with bottle of wine if you drink, don't forget a corkscrew, and enjoy the ride.
also make sure when reserving train, you don't pick a family carriage. our mistake coming from annecy to paris, many babies were crying, fussy, parents walking up and down aisles to calm them down. nothing about kids but not on a 3+ hour ride
good luck with what you decide on and do enjoy
aloha