My husband and I have a 7 a.m. flight on a Sunday morning in October from FCO. While we would love to stay in Rome the evening before (we'll be traveling from Tuscany on Saturday), we also don't want any risk of missing our early flight. Are we better off staying at the airport that night or is there an extremely reliable car service that we can count on to pick us up very early on a Sunday morning at a hotel in Rome and get us to the airport in time for our flight? Thanks!

Your hotel could summons a cab for you or a shuttle service is a cheaper option. There are several companies,here are a few:

www.airportshuttle.com
www.limoservicerome.com
www.romalimo.com

I would always choose being in Rome, even if for just one night.

Twice I've had Rome hotels make arrangements for a car service to take us to FCO for an early flight and both worked out very well. Any hotel should be able to do this for you, so enjoy a lovely evening in the Eternal City if you want. In March 2003 I paid 45Euros for the ride from Centro Storico to FCO in a comfy Mercedes sedan (don't know the name of the car service; Hotel San Carlo arrangd it for us).

Seeing as how your flight out is on a Sunday, you'll have an easier time of it.

Of course if I had it to do over again, I'd stay until 6:00 or 7:00 in Tuscany, then drive to a hotel VERY near the airport on Saturday night, like in Fiumicino and just eliminate the stress of going into and out of Rome. Or arrive in Ostia Antica on Saturday afternoon and explore until you go to a hotel near the airport.

One of our mistakes on our recent trip was not staying at the airport. We didn't want to do this but the stress of making sure we got there in the am just wasn't worth it.

We were in Rome in March and had a 7:10 am flight from FCO. We talked to our hotel and they arranged for a car to pick us up. We were quite nervous about making sure we had a car so we double-checked our request twice! Sure enough, at 5:00 a.m. we had the car waiting for us. The hotel also had a great rate with a car company that they use, which was an added bonus.

One note I want to add: our hotel concierge adviced us that it would take at least an hour to get to the airport. Well, at 5:00 there isn't much traffic and we were there in, literally, under 20 minutes. Just wanted to add that so you can sleep in (a little)!

Tracy

Tracy, After I booked our last night hotel in a pretty little town 28 miles outside of FCO, I nearly panicked when people told me it would take me 2 hours to get to the airport (Monday am traffic on the ring road around Rome). Well, we figured we would leave at 6:00 am to arrive at 7:00 for a 9:00 flight, and we got there in 30 minutes. The thing is, if we left any later, we would have definitely hit the rush hour traffic and possibly missed the flight.

Next time I'm staying at the airport.

Hi lindy,

I also recommend staying in Rome and having your hotel arrange for transportation.

On Sunday morning there will be very little traffic.

To me it doesn't seem logical to leave Tuscany or Amafi Coast or whereever early just to get into Rome for the night. I would linger at my last destination as long as I could then late at night stay at the airport.