misstravelbug

Hi

we will be leaving Tuscany (near Montepulciano) to spend 10 nights in Piedmont.

We will be splitting this between Turin and the Langhe region. We will be hiring a car for the Langhe portion, but not having one in Turin. We then fly out of Milan.

My question is;

would you drive and stop somewhere along the way for 2 nights?

or

train tp Turin and write it off as a travel day. If this option where would you leave from? We will have a car in Tuscany to drop off at the station.

We are a family with 2 children aged 8 and 11 and will have spent a month in Italy before this part of the holiday.

Happy travels.

kybourbon

You could drop your car in Florence and take the train to Turin. There are several trains on Trenitalia (Firenze SMN to Torino Porto Susa or Torino Porta Nuova) that don't require a change and travel time is about 3 hours. Italo also has about 6-8 trains per day on this route also.

massimop

If you're travelling in warm weather, would your kids enjoy two nights at the seaside? With a car, I would head to Lerici or San Terenzo. Or, if you want to ditch the car, drive it to Rapallo and drop it off if you can, or La Spezia. If you drop it off in La Spezia, I would recommend bypassing le Cinque Terre in favour of Sestri Levante as a place to stay. You can take trains from there to Torino.

But if you don't like that idea, most kids like trains, and if that describes yours, then taking the train out of Firenze to Torino might work well provided you are not transporting so much luggage it's a struggle. Recommend dropping off the car in Florence airport to avoid the risk of ZTLs in the city. Take a taxi from the airport car rental offices to the train station if you've got unwieldy luggage. It won't cost that much more than bus tickets for 4 on the airport shuttle.

misstravelbug

Thank you both so much. We will be travelling at the end of May.

Looks like Florence will be the station to leave from.

I was considering stopping in Bologna/ Santa Margherita Ligure if we decided to add an extra place to the trip, as both of those places seem to have easy train connections to Turin.

Just weighing up if 4 nights Turin, 4 nights Langhe area and 3 nights SML/Bologna would be preferable to 5 Langhe/ 6 Turin...

HappyTrvlr

The children would probably be happier with more time in the Langhe than Turin.

massimop

First of all, I assume by saying "Bologna/Santa Margherita Ligure" you mean "Bologna OR Santa Margherita Ligure", because they are in the opposite directions. What I recommend is that you book both places for hotels with excellent free cancellation policies, and then go with the one where the weather is nicer.

If you pick Santa Margherita Ligure I suggest that you either drop off the car in Pisa and take a look at the tower (stow your luggage in the Pisa central train station) or drive the car all the way to Rapallo and drop it off there. You could also drop it off in La Spezia. But I wouldn't drop it off in Florence and take the train (unless going to Bologna).

Lastly, I wouldn't automatically assume your kids will want more time in the Langhe wine country in May than Torino. Don't know your plans are for Tuscan wine country, but Langhe wine country is more of the same with the difference that in May you stand a much higher risk of rain and fog in the Langhe. If the weather is not good enough for hiking and biking in the Langhe hills, there is precious little to do. By contrast, Torino has a wonderfully fun & kid friendly movie museum, underground fortress tours, a car museum, an Egyptian museum & a science museum, plus a chocolate shop tour, plenty of fancy parks and palace gardens for play, fun shopping and big food markets. Just saying.

misstravelbug

Yes, I meant either SML or Bologna, sorry for the confusion.

Thank you, lots to decide upon...