Avellino/Naples to Milan - Suggestions
 

Family of 6 returning on Jan. 4th from Southern Italy to Malpensa for flight to USA. Looking for best option for transportation and recommendations for charming towns & agriturismos along the way. Thanks!

Are you willing to rent a car? How many days can you spend on the trip?

The drive would take about 9 hours. The train would take eight to nine hours, with several changes of train.

I'm even more puzzled now about your decision to fly into and out of Milan.

At which time must you be at Malpensa?
Best trains (standard fare about 140 EUR, actual timetable, there may be slight changes in mid December):
Avellino dp 6.49 - MXP ar 14.41, change at Mercato San Severino, Naples and Milan
Avellino dp 8.07 - MXP ar 16.17, change at Benevento, Rome and Milan
Avellino dp 14.10 - MXP ar 22.17, change at Benevento, Rome and Milan
Easyjet has 4-5 daily Naples - MXP flights for about 100 EUR,

In Italy it is highly recommended that you be in your departure city the night before your flight. Disruptions (traffic jams, strikes, breakdowns) can happen and might cause you to miss your flight. If you miss your flight and have to buy new tickets for 6 people, it will be expensive.

Depending on when your flight leaves, you might want to stay overnight at an airport hotel; Malpensa is some distance from Milan.

Thanks for your responses. As I mentioned in my other post, flying into Milan saves us $600-700 per ticket. Will be in Rome for 4-5 days for wedding and then want to travel south to the village where my grandfather is from which is near Solofra. We have 3-4 days to travel from Rome to South and back to Milan so trying to figure out best options. Probably will drive, but looking for some good places along the way after the village. We prefer agriturismos and countryside and also have some WWII buffs. Oops - made mistake We will be departing from Linate.

familet - if the weather gets bad, you might want to think about driving up the west coast, rather than trying to make it inland. About 150 kms north of Rome is the lovely Orbetello, an etruscan/roman/medieval city set on a lagoon - worth a night in anyone's book. Then further north to Livorno perhaps, and Pisa - great when the buses have all gone home and the monuments are all lit up at night which would happen early in January.

Keeping to the coast you could see Genova, and then it's a relatively quick hop inland to Linate.

if you do it that way it's rather longer in theory, but might be better than trying to deal with the snow that you might experience inland. And with 3-4 days it's doable - just.

However, if you want to spend more time in the south exploring your roots, a much easier option would surely be to fly from Naples to Milan the day before you are due to leave.

" We have 3-4 days to travel from Rome to South and back to Milan. Probably will drive"
So you will see nothing but Solofra and motorways. But it's up to you.

" We have 3-4 days to travel from Rome to South and back to Milan. Probably will drive"
So you will see nothing but Solofra and motorways. But it's up to you.

Thank you for your responses and suggestions.

neckervd - are you saying that we won't have enough time to see anything but the village and then head straight to Linate?