We are planning a 12 day trip to Italy (Rome,Pescara, Serra San Quirico, Florence, Siena and back to Rome)to investigate geneology. What is the cheapest way to these small towns other than renting a car and riding trains? Are there any buses between the larger and smaller cities? We're going on a tight budget. We are school teachers.
Posted by
Pittsburgh, PA, USA
539 posts
There is an extensive bus system, and sometimes that may be your only option depending on where you're going. The trains are cheap, though. For example, a one-way trip between Florence and Venice is e5.20.
Posted by
Seattle
223 posts
Also, you don't mention how many of you are in your group. When you add up the price per-person to ride the bus/train between the towns, you might find that renting a car is the overall cheapest option.
Posted by
OP
Hampton, Georgia, USA
3 posts
Thank you for your information. There will be three in our group. We are seriously considering the car rental since we will be going to some "off the beaten path" places. Jeff, were did you locate a train fare from Florence to Venice for only 5.20? That sounds like a great day trip.
Posted by
Chicago, IL, USA
473 posts
Italian train info can be looked up on www.trenitalia.it. The first page does not have an English link. Type your starting and ending cities in the "Da:" and "A:" boxes. Type your day of the month in the "gg" box and month number in the "mm" box. Click the Invia button. That will bring up a 2nd brower window which has an English link at the top. People have had mixed luck ordering tickets through the Trenitalia web site. So if you are so inclined and you run into problems, consider it normal.
Posted by
San Jose, CA, USA
424 posts
I saved a bookmark for Trenitalia that gets you directly in to the English version:
http://www.trenitalia.it/en/index.html
This will save you a few key strokes and frustration.
Posted by
Pittsburgh, PA, USA
539 posts
Norah, The posters above are correct--I found the information on the Trenitalia website. What I did this year (because the site was so problematic) was I printed the time schedules for the days I wanted to travel to each location (i.e. the general times I wanted to leave and the general times I wanted to return), took the print-outs with me, and then booked at a Fast ticket machine. This worked well.
Posted by
OP
Hampton, Georgia, USA
3 posts
Thank you all for such good info. Now we are intensely looking for lodging on the internet. Three years ago we (2 of us) went to Spain and stayed at a hostal at a very reasonable price. We don't mind "roughing it", as in no A/C, but if anybody knows of a decent, clean place close to where the action is, please let us know. The closer ones are too high.