Book April Critical Trains Now? Help! :)

You've answered your own question when you say if one or two critical train connections are full you are sunk. If you absolutely must have certain trains, book them now.

Except I don't think you would need to for early April. In all of our travels we have encountered a full train even at peak times in the summer. Personally, I would book a day to two in advance however you may require a higher comfort level.

According to the Trenitalia site, there are two direct Palermo-Roma night trains. One departs at 17:00 and arrives at 05:05. The other departs at 18:40 and arrives at 07:23. Since the Trenitalia site doesn't accept North American credit cards, I was curious to see if you could book on either raileurope.com or italiarail.com. Unfortunately, I wasn't surprised to learn that neither train is listed on either site. Their timetables are notoriously incomplete because they only list trains for which they sell tickets.

For expert free advice on trains, call the toll-free number on the BETS site.

If you need those trains, book them and reserve the seats, too. A lot of schools are having holidays in April for Easter/Spring break. We had tickets and seat reservations on the ICE and IC trains we took in December. Everyone said we didn't need reservations but out trains were standing room only for people without reserved seats.

I am sorry, I missed the night train reference. If you are using a night train then you do need to book in advance. Apologize for recommending that you do not. Day trains are completely difference.

Yesterday I made all my train reservations for my upcoming trip in March/April. I did it through RailEurope and the man who helped me said it was good I was doing it now because several of the trains that I need were nearly sold out. And I'll be on 3 overnight ones that have limited rooms. I suggest you do it sooner than later or you might be sorry.