I prefer point to point tickets in Italy. Since Italian trains are generally quite cheap (reservations — not covered by the railpass —are expensive and often double the cost of a train ticket) a railpass seldom saves money in Italy. Many Italian trains require reservations and the ones that don’t are often crowded. While you can avoid trains that require reservations if you’re really flexible about times, you will probably find that the trains you want to take (optimum times) require reservations.

It is fast and easy to buy tickets —which will include the reservation if it’s required — from the automated kiosks or from www.trenitalia.com (and then print them out at the kiosk) without waiting in line. You will have to wait in long lines to buy “just a reservation” to use with your railpass in May and June. If you do use a railpass you can save time by buying all of your reservations at once.

I recommend getting an ID and password from www.trenitalia.com before you leave home.

Thanks for your help oldlady!

So I guess I should follow your advice and go with point to point tickets… I remember trains in Italy were very cheap indeed, and when I was there 4 years ago, I had a flexipass and didn’t use it in Italy.

The only thing that bothers me is that the Florence-Venice roundtrip ticket seems expensive on the trenitalia website (around 50 euros). Are the prices on the site the same as the ones we will get at the station? To maximise our time, we will certainly take the fast trains when the schedules work for us. The Florence-Naples ride seems expensive as well (72 euros std rate – that is if we take the earliest train on June 1st)... If I buy a 3day railpass, the cost is 180$ CAD so each trip using the pass would have to cost at least 60 $ CAD. But I understand that buying seat reservations can be expensive and really annoying too…

I just want to make sure and take the best decision and not regret it while I’m there! This is not easy.

One more thing, would you recommend buying our tickets in advance?

The 50 and 72 euro tickets probably include a 19 euro reservations that wouldn’t be covered by the railpass, anyway.

You’re spending thousands on this trip. Don’t worry too much about $50. I’d rather spend $50 extra than try to deal with reservations in Italy.

Yeah you’re right… I remember having to wait more than an hour at the station in Florence just to get a reservation. What a waste of time! Time is money after all!

I’ll go with point to point tickets. Thanks again for helping me oldlady!

Oldlady, I looked at the timetables and prices on the trenitalia website again and noticed that they have ‘amica’ fares, when you purchase your tickets in advance… From what I understand, the only restriction is to buy your ticket at least 1 day in advance. Have you ever bought tickets with the amica rate? Is it something I would be allowed to buy? Do you recommend buying the tickets on my first day when I arrive in Italy or before leaving?

Thanks!

Yes, you can buy that fare. It’s just a restricted early bird fare. Only a limited number of seats are offered at that fare, so if i were you I’d book online before you leave and retrieve your tickets form the automated kiosks once you get there. That will ensure that you get that low fare, and you won’t have to worry about trains filling up, etc. More info:
http://slowtalk.com/...

I haven’t bought amica ticket but have bought other specials on-line. I would try to buy this ticket in advance from www.trenitalia.com Sign up for your ID and password, now. Then buy the ticket as soon as you’re relatively sure of your plans. Augustin25 describes the process for buying tickets and the limited availability for special fares

Thanks a lot for the info! I will buy the tickets as soon as possible!

When buying the tickets, which ticket delivery option would you recommend, the ‘ticketless’ option or the ‘self service’ option?

I tried to buy tickets with my Visa credit card and it didn’t work for some unknown reason?! Then I tried with my Mastercard and the same problem occured… has anyone ever had the same problem?! What should I do now?! I would really like to get that amica rate…

A lot of people have been having trouble with their credit cards working for bookings lately, not sure what to tell you. The last time I booked on trenitalia’s website was 2004. Hope you get it sorted out.

After trying and trying to buy the tickets with my two credit cards, I decided to try to book them with my boyfriend’s Mastercard, and it worked!! I think we saved like 40$ CAD per person with the amica fare… really worth it! I’m so happy! One less thing to think about when we get to Rome monday morning .

I chose the ‘self service’ option to pick up my tickets at the station… is it easy to do? Will I need my boyfriend’s credit card to pick up the tickets?

I have booked tickets from Trenitalia.com with a Mastercard credit card with no problems. The only time I ever had a problem was with a Visa debit card.