jackiebowyer1

My 22 year old son and I are traveling France and Italy for 3 weeks. Once we leave Venice this is what we have left: we want to visit Cinque Terre and spend a night. We want to visit Florence and spend a night. We want to then rent a car and do Pisa and tuscany villages for 3 days. Then drive down to Rome to drop our car off. Visit Rome for 2 days and a day trip to Pompeii, before we fly home from Rome. Is there a night train from Venice to Cinque Terre, and then we would train to Florence to do the rest of our itinerary? Or should we do Cinque a different way, maybe as part of the Tuscany days with car. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

dwdvagamundo

Do the CT after Florence as part of the Tuscany trip. Pick up a car when leaving Florence and drop it upon arrival at Rome.

If this is your first trip to Italy, however, I'd drop the CT and Pisa, and possibly Pompeii, and spend more time in Florence and Rome.

thursdaysd

No. For schedules see http://www.bahn.de/i/view/GBR/en/index.shtml or trenitalia.it. For general info on European trains see seat61.com.

asps

No. There is not even a direct train between Cinque Terre and Venice.

bvlenci

There's no point in going to the Cinque Terre for one night, with a fairly long trip the day before and the day after. I also wouldn't recommend a day trip there. It's over 2 1/2 hours each way, and that doesn't include finding a place to leave the car and actually get to any of the villages. You wouldn't have time to get away from the tourists hordes. If you go to the Cinque Terre, you should spend two nights and do some hiking on some of the less-frequented trails.

Also, don't even think about visiting Pisa with a car.

Finally, between Florence and Rome the train takes half the time of driving, and costs less.

I have a suspicion that your "days" in each place include the travel time to get there. If so, your two days are really a day and a half, or even less on days when you're making a long trip like that from Venice to the Cinque Terre.

dulciusexasperis

Your plan sucks. You are making the typical tourist mistake of trying to see/do too much in too little time. Heed the advice to drop at least half of your planned stops.

dulciusexasperis

Your 3 weeks total time is enough to plan on visiting no more than 7 places. How many did you have planned for France on top of this 6 you have for Italy?