The Slow Train to Rome

A Learning Experience

Help! We’re in the wrong place and the train leaves in 15 minutes! Let’s pray, then ask this bloke…Scusi, signor, farla inglesi?

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Yes, the timings were a bit tight. Our train from Paris hadn’t arrived in Turin until 9:30 p.m, taking longer than usual ‘cos we’d to take a bus journey over the Alps where the railway tunnel had caved in earlier in that year. Our B&B host in Turin had patiently waited for us, then explained where in the kitchen to find breakfast before we headed out at 7:30 a.m. to catch the tram.

We easily found the stop and boarded, heading for Stazione Porta Nuova (‘New Gate’), Turin’s splendid flagship railway terminus. The city was already bustling with life in the morning sunshine. I typed Torino Stazione Porta Nuova into Google Maps on my phone to check our progress so we could anticipate our arrival. To my utter HORROR, I found we were heading away from our destination! “Quickly Jane – we need to jump off at the next stop,” I yelled, “we’ve just got time to walk there.”

And off we set, trundling our small suitcases through the narrow streets, over cobbles, past colourful, busy market stalls. We walked through a small park and set out along a network of streets until we neared Porta Nuova. But as we approached, the splendid façade of Italy’s third largest station failed to appear. In its place was a drab, modern complex. I rechecked Google Maps, which THIS TIME showed me the real railway station, just past the point where we’d got off the tram! The truth is, there are two places called Stazione Porta Nuova, and we’d gone to a complex containing retail and hospitality outlets, next to the ‘Zero Gravity’ trampoline park.

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“So where do you want to go?” replied the stranger in excellent English. I explained that we’d missed our way, and asked if he could help us get to Porta Susa station, our train’s first stop, which was closer than Porta Nuova to where we now were. He called a taxi, then waited until it arrived and explained to the driver where we needed to go! An angel indeed…

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We arrived in nice time to catch our train. And that should have been ‘it’. Except that ‘it’ had been delayed by 40 minutes, as a freight train had obligingly left the rails somewhere on the track towards Milan. The estimated departure time moved later and later, like a carrot dangled in front of a donkey. Finally, at around 10:30, a train to Rome pulled into the station and on we jumped.

Okay, we realised it was a Frecciarossa – operated by Italy’s national train company, Trenitalia – rather than an Italo train, the company specified on our tickets…but surely under the circumstances nobody would mind?

And indeed they didn’t, not until a rather severe young lady in an inspector’s uniform checked our tickets just south of Milan, where we’d stopped for 20 minutes. Oh no, we’d have to get off at the next station, Reggio Emilia. And, she added, we should be very grateful she hadn’t made us buy new tickets for the journey on her service.  

With decidedly mixed feelings regarding the lady’s largesse, we made our way to the Italo office, as distinct from the separate office of Trenitalia. Here, like naughty schoolchildren, we were upbraided for not waiting for the Italo train. Our protestations, that we’d despaired of it ever arriving, fell on deaf ears. It seems that said train had leapfrogged ours whilst we were interned in Milan station; we’d missed it, and now we’d have to buy fresh tickets to take us to Rome! After my rather public explosion, Jane calmed me down and we shelled out the princely sum of £110 for the privilege of travelling on the next Italo service, arriving 4 hours later than our scheduled arrival time.  

Of course, we wrote a most eloquent letter of complaint which we Google-translated into Italian and sent to Italo the next day. We finally heard back from them 3 months later. Our complaint had been rejected because the service on which we’d booked, had in fact run. But we would be entitled to a £15 refund because they hadn’t responded to our complaint within the statutory 6 weeks. If we present their letter at an Italo office, they’ll discount our next purchase of a ticket to travel on their wonderful trains. Huh.

So, travellers, be warned! I suggest you do some or all of these: