New night train service will connect Marseille and Rome
The Espresso Riviera service – the journey is scheduled to take a shade over 15 hours – will run every weekend from July 4th to August 30th.
The train will depart Marseille and travel along the Côte d'Azur in the afternoon, then the Ligurian Riviera in the evening. It will arrive in Genoa at 10.38pm, and from there it will continue non-stop to Rome.
It aims to revive 'the comfort of the great international trains that have now disappeared,' according to Luigi Cantamessa, head of Treni Turistici Italiani, the Trenitalia subsidiary that offers this service.
On board, passengers will be able to enjoy a dining car serving local specialities. And there's the choice of sleeping cars for one or two people, or compartments with four berths, which are convertible into seats during the day.
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Tickets go on sale from Saturday, May 24th, according to the Treni Turistici Italiani website, with prices for the full journey starting from €71 – though single and double sleeping cars will be more expensive. Tickets from Marseille to Genoa on the same service cost from €54.90.
In comparison, a flight between Marseille and Rome on Ryanair costs around €60. Faster, certainly, but not quite the same experience - the section of track between Marseille and Nice runs along the Mediterranean coast making for one of the world's most beautiful train rides.
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8 French night trains to take this summer
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