Itineraries, route guides and hidden places for the independent traveller. No hire car, no stress — just Italy at its best, seen from a train window.
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Everything you need to know — from buying tickets to Trenitalia vs Italo. Your first Italian train trip, simplified.
Read the guide → 02How to build a realistic, car-free itinerary in Italy — including which regions connect best by train.
Read the guide → 03Trenitalia vs Italo, regional trains, ferries and city metros — a plain-English guide to every transport option.
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Lucca is one of the most quietly rewarding cities in Tuscany — intact Renaissance walls you can walk or cycle around, a Roman amphitheatre whose shape still defines the piazza above it, and almost none of the crowds that overwhelm Florence.
Siena is less than 90 minutes from Florence by direct bus — a UNESCO medieval city with one of the great public squares in Europe, a cathedral that rivals Florence's, underground cellar restaurants and the Palio horse race twice a year. Far less visited than it deserves to be.
Italy by train is fast, affordable and one of the best ways to see the country — but the system has a few quirks worth knowing before you go. Here are the ten things first-time travellers get caught out by, and how to avoid them.
Mount Vesuvius is reachable by train and bus from Naples, Pompeii and Sorrento — no hire car required. This guide covers every transport option, tickets you must book in advance, what the climb is like, and how to combine it with Pompeii, Herculaneum or a vineyard on the slopes.
Capri is worth every bit of its reputation — the limestone cliffs, the Blue Grotto, the two very different sides of the island, and the views from Monte Solaro that stretch to the Amalfi Coast. A full day by ferry from Naples or Sorrento, with no hire car required.
Salerno is cheaper, calmer, and better connected than anywhere else on the Amalfi Coast. Ferries leave directly for Positano and Amalfi. Vietri is two minutes by train. And with Naples just 30 - 60 minutes away on the regional line, it sits at the heart of everything Campania has to offer.