I believe it; despite the fact that Europe isn’t nearly as religious as America, they can nevertheless absolutely shut down on certain holidays. On the plus side, at least you know when Xmas is; there’s all sorts of “feast days” and local celebrations that there’s almost no way to know about until you’re stuck in a place for a day and a half with no hope of getting out

Wow, I’m not sure what’s going on here. I was aware that there was no service on Christmas day, but this seems to last for the last 1/2 of the month. Bahn.de only shows one train a day on this route starting on December 15. It’s an overnight with a connection at Maestre. I tried trenitalia.com and got the same schedule — in Italian, since the English page was apparently down.

I did get this message on a search for Naples to Rome on December 15 at Bahn.de

So maybe it’s just that new schedules haven’t been posted. I’d check daily at:
http://reiseauskunft… or at www.trenitalia.com

Hint — do not buy these tickets from Rail Europe, as they will end up costing twice what they’ll cost if you buy them at the station in Italy. Either buy them from Trenitalia.com or buy them at the station in Italy (fast and easy from the user-friendly in English automated kiosk).

I noticed similar things the last few weeks when looking up trains on the D-bahn, Trenitalia, TGV, and Renfe websites. D-bahn often had different trains listed than the other websites, and Trenitalia was showing some really bizarre schedules – for instance on Dec. 23 the only train that comes up from Venice to Rome leaves at 03:11 and arrives at 09:05 (a night train from somewhere else that goes through Venice?).

We are arriving in Venice on the 20th. Do you think we will be safe if we book the train for the 23rd at the Venice station when we arrive? I’m sure at that time the schedule will be accurate but I don’t wanna chance not having an available train if service is that reduced. Thanks.

I’m not sure how secure I’d feel waiting until the 20th during that time of year. I’d keep checking the Trenitalia website to see if they update the schedule and buy ASAP if/when they do.

I would think the 20th would be far enough in advance to buy this ticket. There are lots of options if one train is sold out as the “normal” schedule has dozens of trains each day between Venice and Rome — a direct one every other hour plus others with a connection at Maestre. However, there are other options for buying the ticket.

1. You can buy in advance from trenitalia.com — looks like the price, with reservation, on the EurostarItalia train would be about 56 euros, or $72 US, which is the same as you’d pay at the station in Venice. Some have posted with problems using an American issued credit card on trenitalia.com and right now you have to deal in Italian as the English link doesn’t seem to work.

2. You can buy it at any major train station in Europe for the same price, or perhaps a 4 or 5 euro additional charge if you’re outside Italy. If you’re arriving somewhere in Europe before the 20th you don’t have to wait until you get to Venice to buy the ticket.

3. If you decide you really need to buy it in advance and can’t buy through trenitalia, use the “booking” tab at the top of this page, then click on “rail tickets” and “Italian rail” A ticket, with reservation on a EurostarItalia train costs $81 US as opposed to $105 using raileurope.com. — there’s probably an additional shipping charge in both cases.

Duh, I just realized you’re not talking about an overnight train. Like oldlady said, you should be ok if you can’t buy ahead.

I assume we’re talking about a day train as the normal schedule is 4 1/2 hours. However, I think the train mentioned in the original post was actually an overnight leaving at 1:23 AM with a connection at Mestre at 3:11… that’s the only option I saw on December 23 when I checked a couple of days ago. Tonight the only option showing on Bahn.de is an overnight leaving at 22:51 with the same 3:11 connection at Mestre. Trenitalia shows only the 3:11 from Mestre.
Hopefully, the new schedule will be posted soon.
BTW, — you can click on “English” from this page at Trenitalia:
http://www.trenitali…

The raileurope site says 1:23PM but the Trenitalia does day 3:11AM. That actually might work better for us since we wanna get to Rome early but if I book on Trenitalia, can I pick the tickets up at the station? Also, the “Service Preferences” section of the site is confusing. It seems like its giving the option of beds and “couchettes” but wouldn’t that effect the price? the price doesn’t seem to update when I play with the seat choice. Anyone with experience booking on Trenitalia know?

I have booked with trenitalia. On some routes you can go “ticketless” and you just print out the stuff and give it to the conductor — or you can use the automated kiosk (user-friendly in English) at the station to print out a ticket using the confirmation number. On other routes you just get a confirmation number and print your tickets at the kiosk.

I’m not sure what the issue is with the type of seating/berth accommodations you choose. I’m guessing if you go through to the end you will get a price based on your choice. The other possibility is that the original problem of not having a schedule posted for late December is causing the problem. Try playing with a ticket for a couple of days from now and see what happens with the various choices of berths. In any case, I would not book this ticket until full schedules are posted.

Personally, I wouldn’t take an overnight train on this relatively short route — particularly one that leaves at 3:00AM from Mestre. I’m not sure how you’d even get to Mestre in the middle of the night and I wouldn’t get any sleep on a train that will no doubt be stopping and starting a lot.

When would the full schedule be posted? Also, I’ve started considering another option of taking a Ryanair flight, but the airport is like an hour bus ride from Venice although it ends up being much much cheaper. The current price for all 5 of us for a 7:55am flight out of Venice-Treviso to Rome-Ciampino is 124.60 Euros total. That’s quite a bargain and it’s only an hour flight as opposed to the 5 hour train. The only thing is getting to the airport starting from Central Venice which is where we’ll be. Decisions…Decisions

Flying this with 5 people sounds like a nightmare to me. However, it may be a good option given the cheap price and problem buying train tickets. I think I’d invest in a phone call to the Trenitalia call center before I’d commit to flying: http://www.trenitali…

Does this include the cost of getting to Treviso from Venice and from Ciampino to Rome? Depending on hotel locations, this could add 100 euros to the trip for 5 people. Any flight takes 4 1/2 to 5 hours with getting to/from airports, check-in time, security time.

I found a shuttle service from Venice to Treviso airport. Only 6 Euros.

http://www.atvo.it/i…

The schedules haven’t been updated yet on bahn.de, but they have been on trenitalia. You can check the schedule, buy the tickets at http://www.trenitali…

Did you book using an American Credit card? I tried but my transaction was denied several times. I called the call center and they said I couldn’t use an American card and they suggested booking through a travel agent. I asked if I could wait till I got there and they said it will be very busy and could sell out. What gives???

I’ve booked on trenitalia with an American credit card and recently booked train and plane tickets on European websites, but only after trying different cards. My Mastercard and Visa debit card were refused but my Visa credit card worked. If you have one try another card, or maybe a family member’s card. I’d definitely try to book before you get over there.

I booked using my American Visa, but it was in 2004. I have heard of others who have had problems like yours — particularly in the last year.

To my knowledge, the cheapest “travel agent” option would be the railkey/wandrian folks (who sponsor this site). However, they don’t seem to have the updated schedules loaded yet. You can get to them by clicking on “booking” then “rail tickets” then “Italian rail” at the top of this page or go to www.italiarail.com or www.railpass.com However, since on-line doesn’t seem to work right now, I think I’d use the “contact us” options at railpass.com