Meeting Your Trip in SPOLETO

This page offers help (concrete or informational) on reaching your trip. Topics include...

1. Where you Join Your Trip (see immediately below)
2. Our “Access Packages,” designed to help you to do so.
3. Suggestions on how to time your trip to the trip, whether you are having us arrange your travel, or doing it yourself.
4. Service information regarding train travel to your trip start location.
5. Suggested pre-trip visits, especially when these are not geographically obvious, but are rendered economical and convenient by direct rail connections.
6. Hopefully helpful hints for those setting up their own travel to the trip.

If you wish to arrange some or all of your travel through us, please tell us what by means of this response questionnaire, designed to collect all the information we need to be able to book your travel.

1. WHERE and WHEN Do You Join Your Trip?

Your trip meets at our Spoleto hotel, Sunday afternoon.

We will send you details of meeting time and place with your final itinerary.

If you wish to make your own way to the trip (in other words, not to set up your travel arrangements through us), a couple of hints on getting there are offered at the bottom of this page.


2. Our ACCESS PACKAGES
as of January 19, 2008

Our “Access Package” includes a rail ticket from Rome to Spoleto.
This ticket can either be “open,” or good on a specific train. Choose thoughtfully: tickets on trains which require reservations can only be used on the train you have selected, and are not refundable nor exchangeable once ordered. “Open” tickets, without a seat reservation, can be used without further modification or formality on local trains (which only take 20 minutes longer than the expresses on this line), or on expresses with the payment of a supplementary charge (but you often miss the train while you wait on line to pay the charge).

Tickets from the airport to central Rome must be purchased locally. Actually, we can sell them to you if you really want them, but they are 10 euros less expensive if bought locally.

Our London Access Package includes an overnight train from London.


Base (Starting) Access Package Price: 19€.
If you are a North American traveller, the $ price (US or Canadian) on your price chart applies until 35 days prior to trip departure. Otherwise €uro prices are transcribed to your invoice in its currency, converted at the exchange rate of the day on which the package is requested (rounded to the nearest whole dollar). Current “mid-market” rates can be consulted from the site we use for conversion. We use the mid-market rate on the day of conversion, and add 2% to cover currency broker exchange commissions (our conversion rates are thus as good as, or better than, any you could obtain, including via your credit card, unless you are a professional currency trader).

Availability is normally guaranteed until 35 days prior to trip start (payment received by us). Within 35 days, availability must be confirmed, and costs may be slightly higher (especially the costs of shipping rail tickets). Some extra-cost options have higher prices if ordered w/in 35 days.

Included:

• 2nd cl. train tickets to Spoleto from Rome’s Termini station.
• A printed schedule / itinerary, highlighting any connections.
• Our “Route Sheet to the Trip,” helping you through your journey.
  

Options Offered at an Extra Cost (subject to availability)
Prices are in addition to the “Base” Access Package Price. For a general discussion of train upgrades, see here. Topics include the relative comfort of first versus second class, and different types of accommodation available on overnight trains.

• Tickets from Milan or Venice (include required seat reservations): +65€. If travelling via Rome, +95€ (we do not normally route you via Rome, since it is no faster, and is more expensive).
  
  
• First class train tickets (in lieu of 2nd class): +10€ from Rome, +31€ from Milan or Venice (discount rate of +19€ sometimes available).
  
  

Alternate Arrangements, in lieu of our usual packages (subject to availability).
Prices are complete (in other words, they are not in addition to the “Base” Access Package Price).

• Tickets from London. 199€ if you are also purchasing tickets back to London, 229€ if not, or if you prefer a changeable return (for 1st class on the ”Eurostar” from London to Paris, add 39€ to either price; 1st class tickets include meal service).
  
  
• Saturday overnight trains from France, Switzerland, Austria, Germany: 125€, including couchette (“Comfort Couchette” and sleeping car upgrades are available: +29€ to “Comfort Couchette,” +49€ to a private double sleeper cabin, +99€ to private single cabin.).

3. TIMING Your Trip

If we may influence your thinking on the topic of timing... Spoleto is interesting, and arriving in time to fit out your cycle will let you test your legs before the “real” ride tomorrow. If you have the flexibility to do so, try to schedule your arrival by early afternoon.


4. Service Information
Schedules are approximate – exact timetables can be consulted at http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/fares_schedules/index.htm.
Best trains are mentioned. Others are slower or have multiple connections.

• From Rome. Travel time is 1’15” by express, 1’35” by local. In general, expresses run at half past the odd hour (and require reservations), locals run at quarter past the even hour (and do not). There is an unfortunate service gap in mid morning: no 10:15a local or 11:30a express.
• From Milan. Fastest trains take 6 hours, most trains take closer to 7. Service is hourly.
  6-hour services at 7a, 11a, 1p and 3p, via Ancona.
  There is a single direct train at 6p, with a midnight arrival in Spoleto.
  
• From Paris, Gare de Bercy. Depart at 7p on Saturday evening, arrive Spoleto at noon, via Florence.
• From Nice, Geneva, Zurich, Munich, Vienna.... Overnight via Rome or Florence.
• From London. Depart at 3p London time to connect to night train in Paris.

5. Suggested PRE-TRIP VISITS

Any of the Italian cities, obviously.... We can set up train tickets from Venice, Florence, Sicily....


6. Hints on TRAVELLING INDEPENDENTLY to the Trip
Guests subscribing to an “Access Package” need not read this section.

See also “Timing Your Trip” and “Service Information,” above, as either of these may additionally help.

We gladly provide travel consulting (schedule or routing information) concerning pre-trip individual travel. In particular, we have invested a great deal to become railway experts. Our service fees are reasonable: a 20 euro charge for all but the most complex projects – or the most simple (for instance, only a 10 euro charge applies if the service is limited to the preparation of a routine rail ticket). You will generally find them well-justified by the time they will save you in research, standing on line, overpaying for your tickets, or all three.

But, for some, this type of research is fun. So, here are some hints, intended to start off hardened “do-it-yourselfers.”

Trains. Schedules for all routes can be consulted on this web site:
http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/fares_schedules/index.htm

Spoleto is on the main line from Rome to Ancona, on the Adriatic coast. Trains run hourly along the line, alternating between local and express services (expresses are faster, obviously, but also more expensive, and there is not much difference in travel times).

Planes. Rome’s Fiumicino (the main, international airport) is the closest intercontinental airport. Perugia (served by Ryanair from London) is just a bit more than an hour away, but the airport (a tin hut) is not linked to the town center by train. Other Ryanair airports in the region are Ancona (2 - 2.5 hours by train), or Rome Ciampino.


If you wish to arrange some or all of your travel through us, please tell us what by means of this response questionnaire, designed to collect all the information we need to be able to book your travel.