Florence Forum: Travel from San Francisco to Florence??

The BEST connecting service is with Lufthansa:

SFO/MUC/FLR

Allow at least 75 minutes connection time in MUC (same terminal building)

I fly between SFO and Italy frequently. Unfortunately there are no direct flights between SFO and FLR (Florence). I believe that Lufthansa goes through Frankfurt from SFO then onto FLR for the shortest duration flight.. For me, it is easier and cheaper to fly into Rome (FCO) or Milan (MXP). As TAB suggested, use something like www.kayak.com to compare flight times, prices, and connections.

Cat what makes Rome your choice if going to Florence? How do you get from Rome to Florence the quickest/easiest?

Thanks!

Most often it is cheaper to fly into Rome. Occasionally, Florence is the same or a bit cheaper than Rome. But in addition to that, I am a frequent flyer with a few airlines that don't make flying into FLR easy unfortunately. I am also a picky flyer and won't fly through certain areas (for layovers) such as JFK. I am not a big fan of LHR (Heathrow) either, unless I can be sure of enough time to make the connecting flight. There is often a backup in security there. And lastly, sometimes for convenience I will just fly out of SJC.

Also, we like to spend a few days in Rome sometimes. There is always something new to explore. So all of these combined reasons sometimes makes FCO the airport of choice.

I have a car so that is how I travel up north to Tuscany. It is about 3 hours to my house. If you don't have a car, then the train would be your best bet. But that Lufthansa flight is pretty good for shortest duration

Thank you so much. Very helpful!

it is a 90 minute train ride from Rome to FLorence -- and you can just buy the ticket at the airport train station when you get a ticket into Termini

It's common to fly into Rome or Milan and train to Florence for those of us on the west coast