Jespere

I'm in need of suggestions - DS is working in London for a year, and DH & I just returned from a wonderful visit over Christmas (boy, does it get dark early over there!). Trip report, including our steak-frites meal in Paris to follow soon.

At any rate, I'm ready to go back, and I'd appreciate suggestions of where I might take DS for a week in mid-April that would include Venice at the beginning OR the end. It would be (roughly) April 14 thru 21st, give or take, and we'd take cheap flights from one of the London airports to the first city and return from the second.

We originally thought Venice, then train to Rome, but then we got to thinking about an overnight train to Vienna. DS would like to go somewhere different (he's been to Rome several times, just not to Venice), and I'd like easy travel connections between the two.

We'd like to book next week, so any and all ideas are welcome!! Thanks so much...

PalenQ

Great sites for lots of info on trains including overnight trains in Italy, Austria, etc - www.seat61.com; www.budgeteuropetravel.com and www.ricksteves.com. I have taken zillions of overnight trains and always find them an adventure - a nice adventure. Many on Fodors however say they have trouble sleeping on night trains so be sure that you can put up with a modicum of noise - even in a private compartment where no one will bother you at all there is the inevitable sound of tracks and speakers in stations the train stops in, etc.

annhig

hi Jespere,

i'm a Venice fan, so I'd happily spend the week there, and if you got bored, you could do day trips not just out to the lagoon, but by train to Verona or Padua.

However if you really want another place to stay, what about Bologna? Easyjet flies in and out of both Venice and Bologna from Gatwick in April on your dates.

lots of info about Bologna here - I would give Venice 4 nights and Bologna 3 if you decide to do this.

otherwise, Trieste would make an interesting place to go after Venice, but I'm not sure about the flights.

annhig

ps - I just looked at the trenitalia website and it takes approximately 90 mins to get by train from Venice to Bologna, if you get the faster trains which cost €40 first, €29 2nd class. no changes, so that's about as easy a connection as you can get!

at the moment mini and other more flexible tickets are available giving quite good discounts if you don't mind booking train tickets so far in advance.

Jespere

Thanks so much, annhig and PalenQ!

Hmm, Trieste! Intriguing! I just caught up on Jamikins and Bikerscott's adventure, and now Rome is beckoning again as well.

I'll start looking thru PalenQ's site list (we likely won't sleep well anyway, so why not "not sleep" on a train?)...thanks again, and Happy New Year everyone!

PalenQ

Trieste to me was a real surprise - one of the most unique cities in Europe - part Austrian in flare - Austrian coffee in the train station and not just cappuccinno or lattes - and in archietcture - a large port with a great recently restored old town center of ancient wooden structures.

For something different Trieste, which we did as a day trip by train from Venice.