Rome to Civitavecchia-Are we Crazy??

[bghtravelgal]

I was thrilled to get confirmation on the Scavi Tour for the day our ship is in Rome. The "bad" news is our tour is at 3:15 pm (ending around 4:45) and our ship sails at 7 from Civitavecchia. Due to concerns about train strikes and time needed to get to/from the station we'd definitely confirm a driver in advance to get us to the port. Does anyone think this is "doable" or are we completely crazy?

 

Has anyone ever been able to change the time of the Scavi tour or must you take what you get?

 

Thanks!

 

~Brenda~

[soedergren]

Hi, if your ship sails at 7 it usualy means you have to be back on board at 6.30.

 

With the traffic in Rome (especially in the afternoon) I wouldn't count on the tour to actually end at 4.45, so I'd try to change the time of the tour.

[soedergren]

Hi, if your ship sails at 7 it usualy means you have to be back on board at 6.30.

 

With the traffic in Rome (especially in the afternoon) I wouldn't count on the tour to actually end at 4.45, so I'd try to change the time of the tour.

[soedergren]

Hi, if your ship sails at 7 it usualy means you have to be back on board at 6.30.

 

With the traffic in Rome (especially in the afternoon) I wouldn't count on the tour to actually end at 4.45, so I'd try to change the time of the tour.

[Susan-M]

I don't think it's worth it due to the anxiety about making it back on time, even with a private driver (not sure what commuter traffic is like at 5 p.m. on a weekday, although you could ask a private driver what his thoughts are on it.)

 

I would try to change the tour time by phoning the number that they include in their confirmation. (Did they give you 30 days from the date of their email to send payment to them?)

 

If you were able to get an earlier tour time, you could take the train (were you planning to hire a driver for the day or just one to take you back to the port?)

[bghtravelgal]

Thanks to all of you for your replies. I've sent an e-mail back to the Vatican to ask about changing times. Since they only offer a few tours in English each day I'm not confident we'll get on, but I guess it's not worth waving the ship good-bye and trying to get to Barcelona....

 

I appreciate your realistic appraisal of the situation-just trying to do too much here I guess!

[cherylakers]

We took the Scavi tour 2 years ago. I wanted to change our times, but they were all booked for the day we took it. The good news is the tours went like clock work. They started right on time and ended right when they said they would because they had another group right behind us. They only take 12 people at a time in each group and they do most of the talking. After the tour you can spend time to visit more the different Popes graves, but I would skip that. Maybe you can get a tour the day before. You would need at least 1 1/2 hours during rush hour traffic to get to the port though. It took us an hour by bus in the morning and it wasn't rush hour.

 

Good luck because the Scavi tour was one of the highlights of our trip.

[Hlitner]

You would be leaving very little margin for problems. Normally, a good driver can make it to the port from Rome in a little over an hour. But, you are talking rush hour time. The good news is that the Vatican is located in an area of Rome where a driver can quickly get to the S1 which gets you going in the direction of the port. You would probably make it to the port with a good 10 min to spare. We might consider doing something this crazy if we knew that it was no problem to catch-up to the ship the next day. If you do this, you had best pre-arrange for a fast car and driver, and have them standing-by right outside the Vatican (the Scavi tour enters at the gate on the left side of the St Peters entrance (looking towards the church).

 

Hank