Venice to Cinque Terre
 

We are planning to travel from Venice to Cinque Terre by train in the month of August. Any advise on the best timing, how to book my tickets, the approximate cost for this one way trip, would be greatly appreciated. We then plan to travel from Cinque Terre to Paris. Which would be cheaper, flying to Paris or taking the train. How do I go about making reservations (for train) and how long owuld it take.
Appreciate all the advise I can get.

Start with Trenitalia's website for train travel within Italy:

http://www.trenitalia.com/

and click on the British flag to get the English version.

You can find train times/routings for August but not prices. However, to get an idea of prices, you can check trains running in the next week or two from today. Prices could rise between now and August but at least you'll have a general idea.

To check train routings to Paris, try the German train website:

http://www.bahn.com/i/view/USA/en/index.shtml

You might check Genova to Paris trains; you can get up to Genova from the Cinque Terre pretty easily by local train. Check airfares from Pisa - Paris to look for flight deals; Pisa isn't far from the Cinque Terre by train. (I use kayak.com to check airfares.)

Check vueling.com, not sure if it flies to Paris, easyjet.com, ryanair.com

We are flying vueling (Iberia co) from Pisa to Barcelona 70 euros, also after a 7 days stay in Cinque Terre.

The train from Genoa to Paris is at least a grueling 10 1/2 trip, not including from CT to Genoa.
Did Avignon to Vernazza a few years back. Add to a long trip a rail strike equals arrival in Vernazza at 11 pm in pouring rain and everything dark.
I would definitely check out flights if we did that route again.

It's very easy to buy train tickets in Italy the day of your trip. Prices are very reasonable.

I did check out Trenitalia, but as you said Andrew, the fares for August arent posted yet, but I will check for the next few weeks just to get an idea of pricing. I will check Kayak and the option of flying between cities, may saves us some time, it'll be interesting to see the prices on those though. I will check out these options, thank you very much everyone for the advice and tips.