CAR RENTALS IN ROME

Personally I would not use a rental car for a trip to Amalfi coast. (and we extensivley use rental cars thruout the EU). Public transportation is wonderful for that area, and driving the road around Positano is not something that I would recomend. Rick's book does a fantastic job explaing all of the transportation options. If you must rent a car, rent thru Kayak, or bokers like Gemut, or my favorite; AutoEurope. I like the fact that I can go to the AE website and play with all of the rental options. Leaving the rental lot at the airport in Rome is easy. Once you find it!)Take a GPS and Michelin map of Italy with you.

I'd pretty much agree with Steve except for a couple of caveats. For four people a car is probably going to be cheaper. It's going to have to be good-sized to tote four plus stuff - - maybe even a small van. The van will handle the roads (I've driven the route a couple or three times). But no matter what you have, finding a place to park is going to be maddening - - to the point that you may only find a place close to a mile from what you want to see. And the sequence just keeps repeating itself. I'm not adverse to renting a car in Rome itself rather than humping all the way out to the airport to get one.

Thanks for the info. I'll try AutoEurope as I was ripped off by Hertz in Florence last March when we were in Tuscany. I speak fair Italian, have a GPS and lots of maps, and lived in Mexico for ten years so crazy drivers aren't so intimidating. Last March, we drove into Rome on the 17 during the huge anniversary of the Unification of Italy and it was a mess! Drove the GPS "lady" nuts with all the blocked off streets! For four of us, the cost of a car rental and the ability to get off the beaten path, go when and where we want, is a good offset. The little Ford Focus we rented was just right. We only had one roll-aboard each plus personal pieces so everything fit - tight - but it fit - our base was in Siena with side trips to Rome and Venice. Thanks again.

We have never had a problem with Sixt in Italy... I have a differing opinion of a car on the Amalfi Coast - I have driven it a few times because we were able to head to different towns and stop when we wanted to. We never really had a problem finding parking - although we didn't have to in Positano because our hotel had an arrangement for parking. Interesting thing about Sixt is that their Italian version of the website for Italy is often cheaper than the English International version. If you can get by with the Italian or get some help, you can save some money. We used it in Florence in April and we had no problem having the Italian website reservation.

Carjet is another booking service that we used a few times... Their full insurance was really reasonable - much cheaper than anyone else. I haven't used them in a couple of years but we were very happy with them in the past.