Transportation from Florence, Italy to Cinque Terra

Lisa, From Florence there are a few direct trains to La Spezia (for the Cinque Terre) or more trains that change in Pisa then on to way to La Spezia. You may enjoy stopping off to check out the tower anyway...I understand there is luggage storage at the station if you do.

There are no train runs to the CT that don't require at least one train change and most likely two. Pisa and La Spezia Centrale are the two most likely places where these changes will occur. Depending on the run, it could take you up to 3.5hrs to get to Vernazza from Florence.

Check out RailEurope site. It shows that there are direct trains that travel from Florence to La Spezia Central. From there you are to catch one of the local trains into whichever one of the five towns in Cinque Terre. I am trying to find information on this half of trip but have been unable to so far.

There are indeed a few runs that do go direct to La Spezia Centrale but they are outnumbered by the runs that require two train changes. Of the 17 runs in a typical day from Florence to Vernazza, 12 require two train changes and 5 are direct to La Spezia Centrale. The directs depart Florence at 6:10, 9:53, 11:53, 13:53 and 15:53. You will also see the occasional run out of Florence to Pisa on an IC, EScity or even the ICN night train. You will need seat reservations on these trains. Seat reservations are not permitted on the Regionale trains. Most of the runs to the CT are on Regionale trains. If you need further assistance with selecting a train run, we can help.

Use Trenitalia.com for trains in Italy. RailEurope only shows the trains that they will sell tickets for.

Lisa, As the others have mentioned, it's very easy to travel from Florence to the Cinque Terre. As Lola mentioned, use the Trenitalia or bahn.de websites to check schedules, as Rail Europe is not a good source of information. You will have to change trains at least once in La Spezia. Some of the trains on that route have two changes, while others only have one change. You'll see the details on the rail website. Note that your starting point will likely be Firenze S.M.N., which is the main station on Florence (which has more than one station). "SMN" is an abbreviation for Santa Maria Novella which is the Church on the other side of the Piazza from the rail station. Happy travels!

Thanks for the info. This was very helpful. We aren't going to Italy until September this year. As you can tell, I am very anxious to plan our trip already. It is getting me excited for our very first time in Europe!