milan to cinque terre
 

hi everyone

can you please give me some information about how to get to
Cinque Terre from Milan Malpensa airport?
thank you for your trouble
helaine

Take a train from Malpensa to Milano Centrale.

Then take a train from there to whatever Cinque Terre town you like. Check the Trenitalia website:

http://www.trenitalia.com/tcom-en

I took a direct train from Levanto to Milano Centrale a few years ago; there must be a couple of trains a day going the other way too, but you can find them on the website above. Some trains won't stop in the smaller Cinque Terre towns, so if you are going to say Manarola and not Monteroso, you will have to change to a local train somewhere (should all show up on Trenitalia).

The trick for you, if you want to try to buy advanced train tickets, is guessing how long you should plan in between your arrival from the airport to Milano Centrale and departure for the CT. Or you can just buy them at full price upon arrival at Milano Centrale. Just know the schedule that day so you know when the trains would depart if you are on time.

You can look up schedules here, Malpensa Aeroporto to the village of your choice:

http://www.trenitalia.com/tcom-en

Trains with one stop vs two run about every couple of hours. Safer to buy tickets when you get there.

thank you for your responses. i had no idea the train ride from milan to cinque terre was 3hours plus. appreciate your sending me the train timetable.
if we were to stay in vernazza do you have any recommendations for lodging?
better yet, which of the 5 towns would you suggest we stay with sightseeing in mind?

Budget? Time of year? The Cinque Terre is now mobbed with tourists much of the year (cruise ships dock in La Spezia and flood the towns with day trippers). Expect big crowds much of the year. And staying in the five towns can be expensive especially in season. I've stayed twice in Levanto, a town one train stop north of Monteroso, as an alternative to the five villages (partly because I'm frugal - Levanto was a lot cheaper, even in September). Levanto is a pretty nice town, actually, even if not quite the "built into the side of the hill" feel of the five villages. I enjoyed staying there.

If money were no object, I'd probably stay in any of the four except Monteroso (which looks too big and popular with the party set, but I never spent much time there in the evening). The quietest towns may be Corniglia (more difficult to access by foot than the other four, because the train station is at the bottom of a steep hill; either hike up the steps or take a shuttle bus up... or Manarola (pretty tiny). Vernazza is really nice - but it's also Rick Steves's favorite town, so that makes it the first choice for many readers of his books. I enjoyed the time I spent in Riomaggiore in the daytime so would probably like to stay there.

Just be prepared for all the tourists (but it's more quiet at night). On my last visit in 2011, I waited in Vernazza to photograph the sunset as the sun went down, with a bunch of other photographers. We all kind of chatted as we waited - and soon I realized that we were all speaking English. I think the tourists can greatly outnumber the locals in the CT.

Porto Roca-Monterosso