Best way from PHL to Pisa?
 

A friend of mine was asking me what I thought about her booking this itinerary from Philly to Pisa: PHL to Heathrow - train to Gatwick - flight to PSA. She would leave at 7 PM and arrive 3 PM, making this a 14 hour trip.

I think it sounds like a gruesome trip (because of the train after the overnight flight), but I did a quick check and can't find anything better.

Any suggestions from the experts here at fodors that I could pass along? Thank you.

US Airways: PHL-LGW, then British Airways LGW-PSA, just over 12 hours.

Delta: PHL-JFK-PSA about 13.5 hours.

Air France: PHL-CDG-PSA about 14 hours.

USAirways: PHL-FCO, then Alitalia FCO-PSA, about 14.5 hours.

USAirways: PHL-MUC, then Lufthansa MUC-PSA, about 15 hours.

And so on...

Any of these will be better than an airport change in London. And you can't really do a PHL-LHR/LGW-PSA trip in 14 hours, as you'll need about 5 hours to safely do the London airport change.

Also, there's no direct train between those airports. Best way is a direct bus, run by National Express.

Okay, I take it back. The itinerary you find on BA, has 4:50 to do the LHR-LGW change. It's possible. But again, it'll be riding the bus, not train.

Thank you rllwam. I will pass these along so they can try to work something better out. I know they got a cheap price (about $720), so I don't know how important this is to them.

I am also going to check on flying into Rome (which for some reason they wanted to avoid) and then flying to Pisa from there or takomh the train, etc.

Does that sound like a reasonable solution?

Or try flying to Milan.

Or,depart from JFK on Delta direct to Pisa.

Celiaanne - All airlines allow you to book "open-jaw" without real penalty. If your friend's going to two or more places, it makes sense to book it that way.

The airports with non-stop service from the US to that part of Italy are Rome Fiumicino (FCO), Milan Malpensa (MXP), and Pisa (PSA). But with a connection in Europe, there are more airports - Florence (FLR), Milan Linate (LIN), Rome Ciampino (CIA), Bergamo (BGY) and so on.

BGY also has non-stop service from JFK in the summer on Eurofly.