Venice Before and After Cruise Departing from Rome?

Greetings. We're currently mulling a few options for our first Med cruise this coming October.

For some reason, right now it's about $500 less for us to fly from where we live to Venice than it is to fly directly to Rome. We're considering flying in a few days early and staying a night in Venice, then taking the train from Venice to Rome a day or two before the cruise. Then we'd train back to Venice the day the cruise returns, stay in Venice that night, then fly home the following day.

I've read that there's high-speed train service between Venice and Rome, but I'd like some opinions from those of you who've been, whether this is a workable option. We have some flexibility on timing, not needing to fly in the day before the cruise or leave the day the cruise returns. Plus, this cruise doesn't stop in Venice and we'd like to spend some time there, if possible.

Thoughts, opinions, suggestions all much appreciated!

Cheers.

You need to weight the cost of the r/t train and extra hotel nights into the equation. I would maybe look at an open jaw into Venice and then out of Rome.

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This is definitely workable, particularly if you intended to spend some days in Italy before and after the cruise and Venice is on your list of places to visit.

Take a look at the Trenitalia website http://www.trenitalia.com - if it takes you to the Italian site there is an English tab in the top right hand corner. Use Venezia Santa Lucia and Roma Termini as the stations in your search.

There are lots of trains between Venice and Rome, the journey takes between 3.5 and 4 hours and will cost around 80 -100 Euros for the return journey. My son lived in Italy for a year and often travelled between cities on Frecciorossa trains, and I have done one journey with them.

They are very comfortable, high speed trains, with reserved seating and wifi.

If you are happy with the cost and to spend the time travelling, and wish to see Venice as well as your cruise, I would go for it :)

You need to weight the cost of the r/t train and extra hotel nights into the equation. I would maybe look at an open jaw into Venice and then out of Rome.

 

 

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Yes, the cost of the train would definitely be a factor. The hotels less so, since we plan on doing several nights before and after the cruise, whether we're in Rome or Venice.

A follow up question: when booking flights in the way you mentioned (flying in to one city and leaving from another), is there any particular way to do that other than just buying two one-way tickets? Any site you recommend, because I didn't see a way to book multi-city like that when I searched on Expedia. This is my first attempt at something like that, so any suggestions would be very helpful.

Thanks!

In Expedia, click on Flights and then on Multiple destinations just below. I would also recommend you check out Kayak and the airline sites themselves.

Have you checked air offered by your cruise line? I see you're an NCL fan. We cruise mostly with Princess and they have been offering some unbelievable fares to Europe...$352 one way Burlington, VT to London Heathrow in August.

You should be able to see much of what Venice has to offer in three full days. Be sure to spend some time in Rome before or after your cruise...you could spend a week there and just scratch the surface.

Is this your first European trip?

In Expedia, click on Flights and then on Multiple destinations just below. I would also recommend you check out Kayak and the airline sites themselves.

 

Have you checked air offered by your cruise line? I see you're an NCL fan. We cruise mostly with Princess and they have been offering some unbelievable fares to Europe...$352 one way Burlington, VT to London Heathrow in August.

 

You should be able to see much of what Venice has to offer in three full days. Be sure to spend some time in Rome before or after your cruise...you could spend a week there and just scratch the surface.

 

Is this your first European trip?

 

Thank you. Yes, this will be our first Europe adventure. Currently studying up on some (very) basic Italian.

I will definitely check the price of flights offered by NCL. It's good to know that's not always the most expensive option.

Greetings. We're currently mulling a few options for our first Med cruise this coming October.

 

For some reason, right now it's about $500 less for us to fly from where we live to Venice than it is to fly directly to Rome. We're considering flying in a few days early and staying a night in Venice, then taking the train from Venice to Rome a day or two before the cruise. Then we'd train back to Venice the day the cruise returns, stay in Venice that night, then fly home the following day.

 

I've read that there's high-speed train service between Venice and Rome, but I'd like some opinions from those of you who've been, whether this is a workable option. We have some flexibility on timing, not needing to fly in the day before the cruise or leave the day the cruise returns. Plus, this cruise doesn't stop in Venice and we'd like to spend some time there, if possible.

 

Thoughts, opinions, suggestions all much appreciated!

 

Cheers.

yes it is a workable option.

Last October, We did Venice (for 4 days) after our cruise ended in Civitavecchia (Rome). On the disembarkation day, we took a shared shuttle from the port to Rome Termini and caught a 2 pm high speed train to Venice, which arrived at around 5:30 pm. (we could have taken an earlier train at 12:50 pm, but we weren't sure we had enough time to make it from the ship dock. We did have time, but already had purchased the tickets, which were non-refundable at that cheap price. We would not have made the earlier 10 am train though) We used Captain Train (now Trainline) to buy our tickets in advance. The cost was around 69 euros p/p, Second class, reserved seating. There were very long lines at the Trentalia desk at Rome Termini, so we were glad to have had tickets in advance.

So plan on one day of travel from Rome to Venice. (and I would assume one day of travel from Venice to Rome)

The high speed train only goes high speed in one long area, otherwise it stops at Firenze and Bologna. it took about 3 1/2 hours. The train was very pleasant and the seats were like airplane seats with more leg room.

Also, Venice is wonderful. You should consider a minimum of two nights in Venice pre-cruise or post-cruise. If you have to fly out the next day, you won't see much of Venice arriving around 6pm and then catching the bus to the airport the next morning.

We took advantage of a seat sale to Venice and Barcelona to get to Europe for a cruise out of Rome a few years ago.

We flew into Venice and spent a day and bit there before heading to Florence for a day and then headed to Rome/Civitavecchia the morning of the cruise.

Part of the reason why we spent a day in Florence (besides that we love it) is that it cut the travel distance to Rome, versus Venice, in half which was important to us since we were "risking" traveling to Rome the morning of the cruise. It also gave us an alternate path to Rome if the main path had issues.

One thing to keep an eye on is labour action. There seems to be a lot of strikes (public, transportation sector, etc) in Italy. And there seems to be limited good information so it creates some anxiety.

Two cruises ago, we almost weren't able to fly into Venice from Frankfurt due to a transportation strike. KLM flights were cancelled but we got lucky with our Lufthansa flight that made it in, albeit a few hours late.

During our last cruise, there was a public strike the day of disembarkation and we weren't sure if our Easyjet flight was going to be able fly out of FCO but luckily it did.

To state the obvious, it's worth staying overnight in Venice as it's so much calmer at night.

To give your itinerary some variety, would you consider flying into Venice and heading straight to Florence and spend your pre-cruise there. And then after the cruise, head back to Venice and spend a few nights there?

Sure, it's a workable option but you should consider several factors (some of which have been posted). The round trip train between Venice and Rome is not free :). And staying in Venice involves some interesting logistics (depending where you stay) and will often require that you are able to handle your own luggage over some distance. As much as we like Venice, not sure we would be doing the round trip from Rome...to simply save a few dollars. The OP might want to explore the cost of an "Open Jaw" air reservation which might have them flying into Venice and home from Rome (or vice versa).

Hank

Thank you all for your very helpful comments.

Since I originally posted, NCL actually changed the entire itinerary of our 10-day cruise on Spirit, so we ended up ditching that cruise in favor of a shorter 7-day on the Epic, also out of Rome. This has allowed us to plan a more extensive land vacation around the cruise.

We're now planning on flying to Paris 5 nights prior to the cruise and making our way to Rome, via Zurich and taking the acclaimed Bernina Express through the Alps. It's supposed to be a spectacular trip in panoramic cars, and I'd be curious if anyone here has done that journey and would share what the experience was like.

We're then going to do one night in Rome after the cruise, and then head to Venice for two nights and fly home on our third day in Venice. I know it's an ambitious itinerary, but we want to do as much as we can while we're there. Plus, flying into Paris and out of Venice is saving us almost $1000 compared with flying to and from Rome, so that's also nice.