Malpensa Airport is it easy!
 

We are landing at Malpensa Airpor around 2:30 p.m. in the afternoon on a Monday. We need to book Eurostar tickets to Florence for that same day. How easy is it to get from Malpensa - getting luggage going through customs and getting to Milan Centrale on the Malpensa Express Bus? We are not sure what time to book the Eurostar so that we don't miss it. What happens if we miss it and need to take the next one? If we have reservations, is there a penalty, will they still let us on?

Thank you all

KP

Eurostar trains leave from Milan Centrale at the top of the hour, going south. 5pm would be the first possible choice, assuming you can get on the 3:30 or 3:50 (Terminal 2; or 10 minutes earlier at T1) Malpensa Shuttle bus, which takes about 50 minutes to Centrale. 6pm will give you a larger margin of error.

if you miss pre-bought/booked tickets in spain and i assume italy, too, as far as i have read here.. you do lose the ticket.

I hope someone will clarify the "you lose your ticket" assumption.

Since ES tickets come with a built-in seat reservation you will obviosuly lose that at the very least and I suspect might have to pay the fee for a new one.

Frankly, unless there is some reason you feel the train(s) will be full I would wait and get the tickets at Centrale rather than booking ahead on Trenitalia.

What time of year? How many people?

Ditto Dukey's comment. If just two people and not on a holiday, you could just wait until you get to Milano Centrale before you buy your tickets.

"lose the ticket" would mean it is no longer good, "gone" "lost"... whatever... to travel on another train you must rebook and repay whatever that ticket costs.

i have asked this question at spanish train stations and also in italy once at an office.

i, personally, would never trust any type of same day, a few hours later, connection when so many variables are at play.

Once you exit customs in Malpensa you will see booths and signs about the buses to Milano Centrale. It's about 5.50 Euros, and it doesn't matter which bus lines you take, they're pretty equal.
You go out to the bus, put your luggage underneath, find a seat and it will take about an hour to get to the train station.
We never pre book train tickets. If you do, and ANYTHING goes wrong; plane is late, the airlines loses a bag, customs takes a long time, you're toast. We always buy our tickets when we get to the train station and have never had a problem. Use the self service ticket vending machines, they're very easy and it saves waiting in line.
If you miss the train there is a penalty.
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I agree with the advice to book when you get to Milano Centrale. On a Monday you could encounter traffic delays on the highways -- but more importantly, your flight may not land on time.

You might consider spending the night in Milan....especially if you have flown from U.S. or equal distance.
There are lots of good medium hotels around the Centrale Station.
Make life easy!!!
Then on to Florence the next day, getting into there at a decent time.
Just a thought!

You might consider spending the night in Milan....especially if you have flown from U.S. or equal distance.
There are lots of good medium hotels around the Centrale Station.
Make life easy!!!
Then on to Florence the next day, getting into there at a decent time.
Just a thought!
We waited over an hour once at Malpensa for our luggage...but that may not be the norm.

Hi kpilling, family members that just recently returned from Italy did excatly as Mari5 has suggested. They had flown from the westcoast of the US to Milan. They stayed overnight in Milan and took the train to Florence, and than on to the small town in Tuscany they had rented a house in the next morning and they were so glad they had made these arrangements, for what it is worth.

Hi everyone,

We are flying in from London on Monday afternoon, should arrive around 2:00 p.m. We really didn't want to go to Milan. We were hoping to catch the express bus to Milan Centrale and then the Eurostar to Florence. We will book our train ticket after arriving at Milano Centrale. Thank you for the advice. I thought about spending the night in Milan, but then thought why - we would like to be positioned to do our only day in Florence on Tuesday. We move on to Siena after that and further into Tuscany afer Siena. We want to at least see the Accademia and maybe the Uffuzzi on Wednesday morning before catching the SITA bus to Siena. Does anyone know how to get the schedule for SITA? We tried the website and have had not luck getting it to come up.

Grazie,

Kp

Yes, coming from London you won't be jetlagged enough to spend the night in Milan. (the Centrale station is out of the center of the city).(I too would purchase the ticket THERE.
This puts you into Florence in the late evening...after 7, probably, if all goes well.
Hope there is no "train strike' as so often happens, or late running trains.
(the Italian trains aren't quiet as prompt as in UK, SWitz, etc).
You have a great trip planned....OH, beautiful Tuscany.
(have you considered renting a car in Siena in order to visit the lovely small towns of Tuscany and travel the countryside?) It's great...and easy driving.

The airport is relatively easy to navigate (but isn't anything like the tiny Pisa and Florence airports, of course) and the express shuttle bus is very easy to find and to use.

I've also had friends on separate occasions wait at Malpensa for hours for missing luggage but that might have more to do with the airline and connecting airport, not Malpensa itself.

The train stations (we went to Florence) were much more difficult for us to navigate, trying to find where we were supposed to go -- upstairs or downstairs, which gate to wait at, etc. I got a great price on our train tickets by purchasing in advance on trenitalia but we needed extra time to be able to find our way around those stations.

Doing "carry-on" only at Malpensa is good advice.