thetrainfamilyItaly really cannot be praised enough as a train country. We are so happy to ride trains here. See my previous posts about the subject. The journey from Syracuse in Sicily to Naples was yet another good rail experience. I have described the first part of the trip from Siracusa- Vila S. Giovanni here. This description therefore concentrates on the second part of the journey from Vila S Giovanni to Naples.
Expected Delay: Navigating a Late Departure from Villa San Giovanni
We were delayed by an hour when we reached Vila S. Giovanni due to a door that could not be closed on the train. This was regretted several times over the loudspeaker and they made aware that compensation could be sought. However, I had read somewhere that delay is normal on this stretch, so we were prepared for that. It got dark shortly after we drove from Vila S Giovanni, but we just managed to see the beautiful view of the sea on one side and the mountains on the other. However, we had something completely different in mind, as the toilet on the train is locked during the crossing from Messina in Sicily and the mainland. We had hoped that it would be opened as soon as we were on the mainland, but we were not so lucky. We were therefore somewhat needy when we finally drove from Vila S Giovanni and the toilet was opened.
Pleasant Journey With Snack Option and Cold Drinks Avaliable
The rest of the trip was very pleasant and we arrived after about 8 hours in Naples. As always, we brought our own food and drink on the trip, but alternatively there was both a coffee machine and two vending machines with snacks and cold drinks. Fortunately, the delay was reduced to 30 minutes on arrival in Naples. We quickly got off the train as it continued to Rome.
Circumvisuvian – Local Train Line around the Vulcano
At the train station we had to ask for directions a few times to find the Circumvisuvian: https://www.eavsrl.it/web/orari-linee-ferroviarie, which is the local train around Vesuvius. We drove 30 minutes with it to Ercolano, where we had booked our Airbnb apartment. We subsequently drove the stretch between Ercolano and Naples several times and it is perhaps worth noting that we paid for a varying number of people each time. Sometimes we paid for all five of us and other times only for three people – ie not for our 9-year-old daughter and our now 7-year-old son. When we paid full price it cost us 13 Euros to drive from Naples to Ercolano. I think it was the right price and that the staff were nice to us the times we paid a lower price. On the local train, the stations are not indicated or said over a loudspeaker, so we had to follow along on Google maps to see how far we had come on the trip.
Again: good train experiences in Italy. We highly recommend Italy as a train holiday country. If you book in advance the prices are very fair and often children travel for free. Eventhough our train to Naples was delayed we had a very good experience with high level of information. This was not the case on the local train around Vesuvius, but the staff was very kind here and sold us and ticket at a reduced price, so we travelled at very low costs on this train.
