Hi. I'm looking into flights & usually try to minimize the number of connections. I could fly out of Atlanta and connect through Amsterdam/London/Paris to Florence or fly from Charlotte through Munich on Lufthansa (I have done this before, but the LH strikes that are going on make me nervous). Or I could take a direct flight to Rome. Any suggestions? How difficult is it to get from the airport in Rome to the train? We are going in September.
Thanks!
We leave next month, IND, Charlotte -direct to
Rome. Then take the train. Why take all the extra stops/planes?
Arrival is mid morning, we plan on a late lunch in Florence. 10 days outside of Florence and back to 4 days in Rome on train. Leave out of Rome. LH was nice but any major airline and the price gets you there. Planning on the strike for a Sept trip, don't worry about that now.
Are you visiting Rome at all?
If yes, then flying to Rome is probably a few $$ cheaper.
In that case you would take the train from Rome to Florence on arrival, then you come back to Rome for the last few days of your stay (since the night before the flight you must be in Rome).
The train station is in fron of the airport terminal. There are a couple of trains that go to Florence without need of a train change. Most however will require you to take the Leonardo Express train from the airport to the Rome main station (called Roma Termini) then switch to a train to Florence. From Roma Termini there is a high speed "Freccia" train to Florence every half hour on average. The trip to Florence is 90 min.
If Rome is not in your plans at all, then you could fly directly to Florence. The airfare is probably more expensive, but generally not that much more. The full fare on the train is about €60 one way per person. So compare the prices and weigh your options..
Additional answers about the air connections are on a similar post.
Last May, we flew direct to Rome from Philadelphia and then took the train from Rome Termini to Florence SMN. I had bought the train tickets on-line 90 days out ("super economy discount" from ItaliaRail). Also had pre-purchased tickets for the Leonardo Express train from the airport to Rome Termini (also deeply discounted on-line in advance), but ended up missing it by 5 minutes. Turned out our departure from Philly was delayed by almost 2 hours due to a mechanical. Fortunately we grabbed a taxi at the Rome airport and made it to Rome Termini with plenty of time to spare to catch the train to Florence. After reading this Forum, I decided to purchase tickets for a train from Rome Termini to Florence SMN that departed about three hours from our scheduled arrival at the Rome Airport (consensus recommendation of several Forum participants), and that worked out fine. So, here are the particulars to give you an idea as to how I planned this: Our flight was supposed to arrive at 9:10; I bought Leonardo Express tickets for an 11:08 departure (with scheduled arrival in Rome Termini at 11:30); and the train from Rome Termini to Florence SMN was scheduled to depart at 12:20. Again, it is always a gamble to purchase train tickets ahead of time when banking on an on-time or near on-time flight. If I did this again, I would still book the Rome to Florence train with the deep discount, and then just buy the Leonardo Express tickets when we arrived. I also had checked the 'on time percentage' of our flight from Philly to Rome and it was about 70%, so I knew the odds were in our favor but not overwhelming. Well, you win some, you lose some. At least we made the longer, more expensive train trip on time and saved quite a bit by the advanced purchase, so the taxi ride was not very painful compared to if we had bought the train tickets from Rome to Florence at full price upon arrival.
