website/ resource for driving times/distances
 

Does anyone know of a website that gives accurate driving times AND distances from various Italy cities? There are several places I am trying to estimate in order to make reservations for museums, dinner, etc. Specifically, wondering how far the cinque terre is from San Gimignano and if it is possible to add into our itinerary- just for a quick trip. <BR><BR>Other distances I would like to estimate driving times for: <BR>Orvieto-San Gimignano<BR>San Gimignano- Florence<BR>San Gimignano-Varenna<BR>Varenna- Milan city center<BR>Varenna- St. Moritz, Switzerland<BR><BR>Any recommendations of a resource for figuring this out would be much appreciated!<BR>

I always use www.viamichelin.com for itineraries within Europe.

Last time I checked, michelin.com had an excellent driving planner site for Europe that will do just what you need.

Mapquest.com also can do it. i found there time estimates to be a bit longer than they actually took for highway driving.

I've found this one easy to use (but haven't put it to the test yet as I'm still in the planning stages):<BR><BR>http://www.shellgeostar.com/share/

Here it is: http://easytour.dr-staedtler.de/

www.mappy.com<BR>Superfast, works in miles or km, gallons and liters, etc..

I, too liked www.mappy.com - - but recently it seems to be in French only (I didn't re-check it just now).<BR><BR>For city maps, it is excellent - - and one advantage over Mapquest is that its "pieces" cut and paste together perfectly to make bigger maps if you want to take the trouble.<BR>Best wishes,<BR><BR>Rex<BR>

<BR>Rex, mappy.com works in English, German, Spanish, French, Italian and Dutch. The language option bar is just below the heading.

Thanks to you all for this info. It is most helpful in trying to plan! I have had bad luck in the past with mapquest as far as the most direct route to take, so I was a bit reluctant. Hopefully these will be more precise as far as miles and time it takes to drive! Has anyone driven any of these routes? If so, what was your experience?

I have done the Orvieto-San Gimignano and San Gimignano- Florence. I don't remember the exact times but not too bad (maybe 1 hr or so each). Very easy highway driving and the toll booths take credit cards. Florence is a little tough once you enter the city. San G. has a parking lot write outside the city wall. Orvieto we drove into. Not too bad but we did have trouble finding our hotel. Once we found it, we had someone from the hotel park the car.

Two years ago my friend and I drove from Cinque Terre to Siena, which isn't too far from San Gimignano. If I recall correctly the drive was over 3 hours...perhaps a bit more. So depending on what your idea of a "quick trip" is, it might be a bit too much of a haul. I would definitely not recommend doing a day-trip. However if you give yourself at least one full day for Cinque Terre and one full afternoon for San Gimignano -- and allow 3+ hours of driving time between the two -- then you should be ok. Hope this helps.

Thanks, "how far". The site seems to take a little time to fully load, and I may have been a little impatient in waiting for that language selection bar load.<BR>