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Gate 1 Fly and Drive Trip Report

Pittsburgh...
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Gate 1 Fly and Drive Trip Report
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This was our first time booking a package deal like this one and I'm pretty sure we won't do it again, but it was still perhaps our best travel experience ever--because of Italy.

We had some pre-trip issues because we had flight changes that Gate 1 didn't communicate until a month after the fact, then our hotel was changed the day before we left because of a plumbing problem in the original hotel. I don't feel that Gate 1 handled any of this particularly well, even though none of it was their fault. It just isn't that hard to press "send" on an e-mail, and their phone service was borderline rude.

That being said, when we got into Milan the car rental company upgraded us at no cost to a Peugeot 208 diesel (which was great because it was fast and fun and fuel is very expensive). The trip down was pretty smooth once we were out of the airport and was a great introduction to driving in Italy--which I loved, but might not be for everyone.

You should spend a lot of time researching driving, ZTLs, Italian road signs, and routes before your trip. We didn't have a GPS but were able to precheck our routes on our phones via hotel wifi and bought a really detailed map once we were there. It's probably a good idea to just get moving and get down there as quickly as possible rather than making a bunch of stops, given that you've just spent a million hours in a plane.

The Hotel Terme Pellegrini, our substitute hotel, was full of older Germans on a package tour who spent a lot of their time going down to the basement "treatment room" in bathrobes, which was a complete hoot. It was a little tired but in a fantastic location, right on the Piazza del Popolo, a short walk to everything.

Montecatini Terme doesn't warrant more than a day of your trip, but it's a good spot for getting to places like Florence, Lucca, and Siena fairly easily--right off the autostrada and on the main train line heading west from Florence. We spent one day when my husband was a little under the weather walking up to the funicolare and wandering around Montecatini Alto, which was really wonderful. Aside from that we basically left after breakfast and came back for dinner every day. I can recommend Don Chisciotte on the square for absolutely fabulous food...other people seemed to have issues with the service, but we thought it was fine. The Pasticceria Giovannini just down the way was a great stop for a pastry.

Our days were:

1. Top speed to Montecatini Terme, took a long time finding the hotel and a place to park, unpacked, nap, and superlative dinner.

2. Train to Florence, lunch at the market, wandering around the city in a big circle, heading back. Be sure to check the train schedule; they end fairly early, so you might want to have lunch there and head back for dinner.

3. Montecatini Alto by funicolare, charming and great views.

4. Siena. We took the incredibly scenic SR222 through Chianti to get there. It's very hard to figure out the outskirts of Siena and you have to be careful about the ZTLs, but it's so absolutely worth it once you're there.

5. Lucca. We went by car but the train is easy, too. It was rainy while we were there so we didn't rent bicycles, but it was a completely magical city that's well worth a day.

6. We didn't mean to go to Pisa but missed an exit so we just went with it and spent about 45 minutes at the Piazza dei Miracoli. Our main thing for this day was heading into the mountains of Lunigiana, where my family is from.

The Milan hotel was a little difficult to find. The dinner was not great and it's not in a good spot to walk to anything else, but the breakfast buffet was way above average. It was good to be able to get to the airport in the morning without much driving.

So, great trip! We're going to go back to Italy as soon as possible, but we'll book everything ourselves. It's just the way we roll.

Feel free to ask questions!

Edited: 8 years ago
Powder Springs...
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1. Re: Gate 1 Fly and Drive Trip Report
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Thanks so much for the report. There are 4 of us going in October on this same Gate 1 package deal. Since there are 4 of us and we didn't want 2 separate rental cars, we were able to switch out to a minivan and actually got a credit back that we are using for an extra night.

Is a full day needed for Lucca and a full day for Siena? We were planning on doing those as probably a half day. Any reason that you decided not to visit the Cinque Terre, or was it just a matter of running out of time?

Pittsburgh...
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We're fairly relaxed travelers. We don't usually get a terribly early start, and once we leave we tend to enjoy wandering around, looking at things, stopping for lunch, wandering some more. We didn't go with a big list of must-see places, just figured we'd go with the flow. Siena was essentially a half day for us because we drove the back roads through Chianti to get there. Lucca was closer to a full day, but in Italy it's hard to spend less than two hours at lunch so a big chunk of that was spent having a nice meal. With this trip you have to remember that with the drive on either end, it's basically only five days--or six since you added one on.

Although it was our first trip to Italy our assumption going in was that it would be the first of many. The Cinque Terre is over two hours by train or over an hour and a half by car, and you can't park anywhere near those villages. While I'd love to go at some point, I'd probably rather do it as a multi-day trip hitting the villages by trail.

By the way--I'd definitely get the smallest car that would hold your group. There's a reason that the stereotypical Italian car is tiny! Even in Montecatini Terme a lot of the roads are narrow and a minivan might be awkward and inconvenient.

Powder Springs...
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Good info, especially concerning the rental car.

My group isn't as relaxed and won't want to casually wander as much. I like to get a somewhat early start and get as much in during the morning and afternoon knowing that meals will be a bit more drawn out.

As far as the Cinque Terre, I'm planning on an early start where we drive to La Spezia and then take the local train to the actual towns with maybe a hike between 2 of the towns. I've got an all day tour there in mind to maximize what we see and do.

Do you have any restaurant recommendations in Siena, Lucca, Montecatini Alto, etc? Also, I was a little puzzled by your comment that trains between Florence and Montecatini ended fairly early. In looking at the trenitalia website, it looks like the last train from Santa Maria Novella in Florence leaves at 10:10 pm arriving in Montecatini at 11:00 pm. I think if I had a dinner reservation in Florence at 7:00 (7:30 pm at the latest), that I could make it back to Montecatini that night.

Thanks for the detailed info. I used a lot of very detailed info from the TA forums in booking a lot of cool things in Paris and Brussels last year. Made a huge difference between a good trip and a great trip.

Pittsburgh...
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The reason 10 might be a little early is that most Italians seem to start dinner around 8, and it's generally a fairly long affair. We finished up after 11 on a few nights--very easy to do if you have an antipasto and dessert, even if you don't do the whole primi-secondi-contorni meal.

In Florence we had lunch at the Mercato Centrale, which is a really great experience. The upstairs of the market is set up with various food stalls and you can fan out and try a bunch of different things: meats/salumi, seafood, bakery, craft beer, wine.

In Lucca we had lunch at Da Leo, not far from the Piazza San Michele. Very good and fairly packed (it was a rainy day so the outside wasn't available). More locals than tourists.

I can't remember the name of the restaurant we went to in Siena, but it too was very good. I'd recommend getting away from the Campo in Siena--prices will go down a few euros and quality may go up.

Aside from the ravioli in Sassalbo, where my great-grandmother lived, Don Chisciotti was as good or better than any of the restaurants we tried. It's one of the great things about Italy--it's hard to find a bad restaurant!

Grand Blanc...
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5. Re: Gate 1 Fly and Drive Trip Report
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We are doing the exact same trip in Sept. I do have have a few questions.

1. How was the driving in Italy? We were warned it is terrible.

2. How far away is the train station from the hotel?

3. Which train did you take? I am trying to plan a few day trips to Venice and Rome but not sure if we should drive or take the train.

Any advice would be great.

Pittsburgh...
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1. I loved driving in Italy, but I've driven in a lot of countries and loved most of them. You definitely need to a) know how to drive a manual transmission car as well as you do an automatic because there are very, very few automatic rental cars, b) read up on everything from parking regulations to local driving styles (this http://www.slowtrav.com/italy/driving/ is a great resource), c) understand enough Italian to read signs, d) be prepared to get lost anyway. The autostrade are absolutely fantastic and the back roads are gorgeous.

2. Maybe 5 minutes walk? Very close.

3. You do realize that Italy's not a tiny country and that it will take around 3 hours each way for Rome and maybe 3 1/2 for Venice, even using the Frecciarossa bullet trains? You can check schedules at trenitalia.com, using Montecatini Centro as your point of origin. There's plenty to do and see within an hour's travel from Montecatini Terme. If spending spending 7 hours in a train means that you're going to skip somewhere like Siena, IMHO that would be a huge mistake.

Sacramento...
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I'm doing the same Gate 1 trip. When you were in Milan, did you look into going into Milan to explore the city? Was any public transportation available from the hotel or did you feel isolated at the hotel?

Sacramento...
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8. Re: Gate 1 Fly and Drive Trip Report
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I'm doing the same Gate 1 trip. When you were in Milan, did you look into going into Milan to explore the city? Was any public transportation available from the hotel or did you feel isolated at the hotel?

Pittsburgh...
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We had a very long stop in Lunigiana on the way back, so didn't get to the hotel until almost 8. You could drop the rental car off early and take a train in from the airport, which is about 10 minutes away, if you don't use your day to make other stops on the way (I hear good things about Bologna). The airport is pretty far from the center of Milan, maybe 45 minutes on the train.

Winnipeg, Canada
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Thanks for your great report. We're there in 3 weeks.

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