Train Travel In Italy

You can use the Trenitalia website: http://www.ferroviedellostato.it/homepage_en.html
to get the schedules and fares for the various legs. It looks like the train from Naples to Sorrento is a different line so you might have to get that fare separately.

Have a look at that website, 'The Man in seat 61'. Excellent site. I heard about it on here and just got the book last week.
Have a nice trip!

Without doing the homework of comparing p2p with the pass, I would guess for the limited trips the p2p would be cheaper and especially if you took advantage of the early purchase discounts. Then there is no question that p2p is cheaper.

If you want to purchase tickets from Trenitalia but the website is being fussy, try them.

We spent 7 weeks in Italy last summer. Point to point is easy, and far cheaper. There are numerous machines in the stations, even small stations. They have instructions in English and accept US credit cards. There's usually only one or two people in front of you; it takes about two minutes to purchase a ticket. We usually purchased them upon arrival in a city for our departure, but also just arrived on the day we wanted to go and never had a problem finding a seat (first and second class). Remember to punch the tickets on the little machines at the track.

Note that if you have a railpass, it won't cover the train journey from Naples to Sorrento on either the private Circumvesuviana train system or the ferry. It's only 3.5E each way on the train so you won't go broke on this one. Also, Italy will charge you a 10E supplemental fee for each Eurostar you are on. I see one between Venice and Florence, one from Florence to Naples and one back to Rome from Naples. That's 30E on top of the cost for your pass.

Well, again I think that the rabid fans of individual tickets are giving poor advice, arguing that point-to-point tickets is the only way to go. Yet Anthony's (and son's) simple question: pass or tickets for the rides they planned, is a classic example of the advantage of a pass. In this case, Trenitalia's Saver Pass for two persons, which costs $180 each for three days, or $60 a day. Do the math! Venice-Florence is 43 euros; Florence-Naples is 72 euros; Naples-Rome is 45 euros, for a total of 160 euro, all on the fastest trains, equal to $237 at Thursday's exchange rate of $1.48=1 euro. Adding three reservations at 10 euro each makes the overall total 190 euros, equal to $280. That's $100 more per person over the pass!!! or $200 for Anthony and his son. How can the ticket fans argue that their way is cheaper? Think about it, Anthony!

Guy's math is off a bit. Seat reservations are included in the price of point-to-point tickets so the total for standard fare tickets is €160 ($237)/person. The cost of a Saver Pass plus three seat reservations is $224/person. So yes, the pass would cost less; but not much less. However, booked in advance on the Trenitalia site, Mini fares total $157/person.