Help on choosing connecting trains when going Riomaggiore to Wengen

Jenn,

Rather than try to focus on each train connection, I'd suggest looking at the overall route. On the current schedules, there's a departure leaving Riomaggiore at 07:18, arriving Wengen at 15:21 (time 8H:03M, 6 changes at Levanto, Milano Centrale, Spiez, Interlaken Ost, Zweilütschinen and Lauterbrunnen). The change at Zweilütschinen may just be a stop while they split the train, with the back half going to Grindelwald. When you arrive at Lauterbrunnen, you'll have to transfer to the Wengernalpbahn cog railway for the trip up the hill to Wengen.

It will take a bit of effort to buy tickets for that route, but it's not especially difficult. You might try something like this.....

• Riomaggiore to Levanto - buy your ticket at the station in Riomaggiore the day prior to travel. Don't forget to validate prior to boarding the train on the day of travel!
• Levanto to Spiez - buy your tickets online when they're available either using the Trenitalia website or www.captaintrain.com (registration required and it's a very user friendly site). Although you may not get the discount associated with the Swiss half fare card from Domodossola to Spiez, I doubt that's going to make a significant difference in cost. Reservations will be included with the tickets, and you'll need to sit in the assigned seats.
• Spiez to Wengen - buy your tickets online from the sbb.ch website.

Although there are a lot of changes, that's actually a fairly easy trip. You'll arrive in Wengen in late afternoon, in time for a brief walkabout and then a fine meal in your new location.

Jenn, I am far from an expert but when I check sbb.ch, I see a 7:18 departure from Riomaggiore, with changes in Levanto, Milano Centrale, Spiez, Interlaken Ost, Zweilütschinen, and Lauterbrunnen. It takes 8:03.

When I try Trenitalia, I can go as far as Spiez (first stop in Switzerland). It has changes in Genova Príncipe and Milano like you have. The rest of the trip I see matches your times -- but I didn't see a change in Domodossola.

Can you not book your entire trip on sbb.ch, just for ease?

We did this same route several years ago and I was as confused as you - but our trip was made worse by the closing of main tracks due to avalanche damage. We had a change in La Spezia and that train was an hour late. Had the train leaving Milano Centrale not also been late, we'd have had some difficulty. :) It was a day to remember! I also had some wonderful reassurance from this board on the right route to book! Hopefully someone else will jump in to help!

Lol! I should have waited to hit "Reply"!

Thankyou both. Looks like all three of us have the same route and almost the same trip. I have since discovered that the Milano to Spiez is lke you both said the same train. The Eurocity 52. So I will now try and purchase with the split in the journey in Spiez. I think that would be easier.

Thank you both for your time.

Incase my research may help someone else, I have just tried a few different dates and tried splititng between trenatalia and Swiss Ticket Shop and the Swiss ticket shop worked out cheaper and easier by booking the whole journey with them. However, I am looking only for the month ahead as this seems to be the only time I can get tickets on both websites for the same journey and this may not take into account any discount given to the Italian sector if booking in advance. Overall cost was around AUD 124 from Levato to Wengen using Half Fare Card. Taking in the advice to purchase Riomaggiore to Levato day before at station.

To get this far has taken many many hours of research which is why I have done this follow up. Hope it helps.

Cheers

Jenn,

Note the spelling of Levanto. Trenitalia will be uploading their schedule revisions for the latter part of the year in about mid-June, so tickets for September should be available before then.