One of the tricks of renting a car in Italy is knowing when car rental offices are open and how that fits into your plans. What you don't want is to arrive in Siena or Lucca and then need to wait around for hours (with your luggage) for a car rental office to open.

I have to admit I am curious as to why you are going south to Pienza before going to north to le Cinque Terre. Also, what time of year are you traveling? In off-season, it might be simpler to keep the car and drive it to le Cinque Terre.

What is your itinerary and what month is this trip?

I don't think it makes sense to travel to Siena to pick up the car unless you were planning on visiting Siena.

See if you can drop the car in La Spezia.

FYI - If you are using AutoEurope, you must match pick up location with drop off location (Hertz location to Hertz location, Avis to Avis, etc.) or it will tell you no cars available or pick another drop.

Thanks for the input. We will be leaving Florence on Oct. 27th for 3 nights in Pienza. I mentioned picking up the car in Siena on the chance it would be a lot easier. We want to end our trip in Cinque Terre for 3 nights. If we can drop the car off there then that would seem to make more sense.

There is a Hertz location in walkable distance from the Siena train station. The other car pick up locations in Siena are more central and might work better with taking bus from Florence, but I'm not familiar with the actual locations.

I think we are going to take a bus from Florence to Siena (unfortunately since it will be Saturday we have to pick up the car by noon). There are 3 Autoeurope offices in Siena there are also 3 offices in La Spezia where we will drop off to take a train to Cinque Terre. Would anyone have advice on which offices to try to choose?

It is very easy to leave Florence with a rental car from Borgo Oggnisanti for the autostrada heading south . It would be much easier to rent in Florence and avoid a bus ride.

"There are 3 Autoeurope offices in Siena there are also 3 offices in La Spezia . . ."

Maybe you are confusing Autoeurope w/ Europcar or something?? Autoeurope is a broker and doesn't rent cars itself nor have offices in Italy.

http://www.auto-europe.co.uk is the least expensive car rental we have found. They are a broker, but still the prices are cheaper than going to the individual agencies themselves it seems... Maybe it is the UK on the link? Is it easier to drive from the airport than Borbo Oggnisanti to head toward Gaiole in Tuscany? It would be the Thrifty office which is open on Sunday in downtown area, but I am concerned about returning it and traffic on a Tuesday. This is our first trip to Italy and maybe I am too worried about traffic in Florence. We are arriving on the train from Venice on Sunday , Oct. 14 to the main station in Florence to pick up rental and drive to country area of Tuscany. Any advice appreciated.

Autoeurope.com mentioned 3 offices in each city--does that mean 3 different car rental agencies? Does one just try to look at a city map to try to determine which one is easier to get to or is there some other way?

I would think it's three different companies. Take a look at Hertz,Avis and Europcar locations on their websites. You will have to match companies as I said earlier in the thread.