Train from Orvieto to Rome station- 11:23 the earliest time??
 

Wring down some info, time to drop our car at the Orvieto train station etc.., and I was looking for the times that the train runs from Orvieto to Rome on a Thursday in mid September. It looks like 11:23 am is the earliest time? Can that be right? We were hoping to leave earlier. I'm wondering now I'd it would be better to drop our car off closer to Rome? Thoughts?

You probably forgot to change the search time.

I put in 9 am :/

I guess that is the earliest to Termini after 9.

According to my search results, there is a train 8:05 to Termini and a train at 8:59 to Tiburtina.

There is a gap in service. 9am just misses it.
For example, on 9/18,

7:31 to Termini
8:05 to Termini
8:59 to Tiburtina
then a <gap>
11:23 to Termini

This type of service gaps are not that rare in Italy.

Thank you! I wasn't sure if I was just doing it wrong. The earliest we can drop our car off is 8:30 am unless you can drop off before the office opens?

Since those are regional trains you just buy tickets before boarding - no reason to go thru the pain of advance purchase on trenitalia.com. No reservations possible - can always board. 1st class will mean a lot of empty seats always IME - 2nd class usually but not always. For lots on Italian trains check www.seat61.com; www.budgeteuropetravel.com and www.ricksteves.com.

The 8.05 is a night train that stops only for unloading passengers. So either 8.05 or 11.23. Usually gaps are due to line maintenance.

This type of service gaps are not that rare in Italy>

Yes IME too - high-speed routes have much more frequent trains - like Florence to Rome hourly or more on the newish high-speed line, taking service away from the old rail routes now relegated mainly to dumpy regional trains (dumpy compared to the high-speed ETR-type traction trains).

If taking regional trains be SURE to cancel your own ticket before boarding the train or you may get controlled and be considered to be without a valid train ticket - so before boarding stick it in the cancelling/date stamping machines in the station by the platforms.

Well, you could try dropping at Rome Fiumicino (Leonardo da Vinci) airport - (1.5 hours from Orvieto by car according to Google) and then take the express train from there, leaves every half hour. I suggest the airport as it has regular transport into 'town', will be well signed and is at least somewhat out of Rome proper (which I personally wouldn't want to drive in, but then I'm a wuss...)

>>>The earliest we can drop our car off is 8:30 am unless you can drop off before the office opens?<<<

You can't count on those hours. Don't be surprised it no one is there when they are supposed to open. This Hertz location is a franchise, not company owned. Take pics of your car when you are picking it up and note any damage. I've had this office try to blame me for damage (car was hail damaged when I picked up in Siena). YMMV

If you are spending the night in Orvieto, return your car the day before. They should be open until 7:30 pm or so. The funicular back up to Orvieto quits running around 8 or 8:30 though.

What does that mean that the 8:05 is a night train? The owner of the farm we are staying at is so helpful. He said to get to the airport in the morning would most likely take 2.5 hours with traffic :/ We are going to call Hertz and see about the after hours drop off which says is available (we will take pics) and would take the 8:05 train most likely but not if that one isn't an option?

Some night trains have seats (you can sit up all night like overnight flights in economy) and sleeping berths (cabins/couchettes). Other night trains only have cabins with sleeping berths (no seat areas). This train says you can ride (for the price an IC train ticket would cost), but you have no right to a seat. If there are no seats on this train (meaning they don't exist at all on this particular train), you would be standing the hour it takes to reach Rome.

http://www.raildude.com/en/vienna-kl...-city/10063/92

EN 235 night train Vienna to Rome - see if you can book a ticket from Orvieto - night trains though are notoriously late at times.

But like someone above says if you buy a regular ticket for that train you may have to stand as this train I think has mainly sleeper cars and couchette wagons and nothing else - no reason to pay the sleeper supplement for a one hour trip.

So how do the orvietani earn a living?

The place is 75 miles from central Rome. Anywhere else in the civilised world, they'd be queueing round the block at 0830 to catch the first post-commuter train into town for their meetings. In Orvieto they have to stay in bed till 1100.

Rotten service like that is the price communities pay for preposterously underpriced railway tickets (€7.10, believe it or not). Which is why unemployment in Italy is running at 12.6%

Charge a sensible price, provide trains that get people to work, rather than boys' toys that flatter adolescents' egos, cut the dole, and Italy might stop sponging on the rest of us. And destroying its children's future.

Tell us what you really think, flanner! :))

Flanner, you missed the point that there are trains departing at 7:31a, 8:05a and 8:59a. They just don't work for the OP who has to return a car before boarding a train. But I'm sure that rant felt good at the moment.

Not to mention that the Italian working day starts at 7.30 am and there are plenty of trains leaving Orvieto before 7am. So much for the lazy south. Gaps in Italian service generally fall later in the morning when commuters and school children have reached their destinations and the tracks carry longer haul intercity and freight trains.

Today's Italian rail system is in much better shape than the one Margaret Thatcher left the UK. Since the UK isn't in the euro any money Flanner is sending to Italy is entirely his own choice.

Of course Italian children do not have a future filled with as many happy hours as those being raised in the UK. Get up bright and early in the morning in London and you'll see for yourself the evidence of those many happy hours with rows of young adults face down in the kerb in a pool of puke from binge drinking.