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See Italy by train
Milan's central station was where we started to love Italy's trains, says Angela Cobban
By: Angela Cobban
In fact the secret to getting round Italy is by train - forget domestic flights, or driving unless you have to. City-to-city, nothing beats the train.
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Among the other hybrid travelers getting off one leg just now were Ermenegildo Zegna-clad types with Louis Vuitton wheelie-bags, well worn of course. Our good friend Jean-Marc Droulers, owner of Villa d'Este on Lake Como, always takes the direct train when going to his other beautiful resort, Lake Massa, 15 minutes' drive from the center of Florence. By car, says Droulers, it can take anything from three hours to six, depending on the traffic. On the train, it is 3.5 hours, and he can work or sleep onboard: he also shared that there are hourly 20-minute trains from Como to the center of Milan. Yes, this is arguably the most interesting country in the world when it comes to rail travel.
It saves time, and money, to plan ahead, especially if you are a foreigner and not currently in Italy. First, buy a Trenitalia pass, either direct from the Italian government-owned company, or from a ticket wholesaler. Whatever, before your first stop, you need to buy seat reservations for each leg, and this takes time. The waiting line when I arrived at Milan Central Station (Stazione centrale di Milano, or Milano Centrale) was actually sensibly divided into several branches, all zigzagging towards two or three desks. Judging by the lengths of this zigzag, this looked likely to take an hour or more. In fact after a mere 25 minutes I confronted an ambassadorial type who summoned me up to his desk. He spoke perfect English, did the necessary, let me see his screen as he checked trains, and processed the credit card.
It is worth admiring the architecture of Milan Central Station, which Frank Lloyd Wright apparently said was one of the two most beautiful in the world, the other being Washington DC's Union Station. Like its counterpart in the USA, Milan Central Station is already being beautified and turned into a destination in its own right. Architect Ulisse Stacchini, who won a competition to design Milan Central in 1912, in fact modeled it on Union Station. Progress on construction was at Italian snail pace, and it was not officially opened until 1921. It is said that Mussolini, as Prime Minister, was keen that the facade should represent the power of the fascist regime.
Another tip. If you have heavy baggage, you need to order porterage ahead of time. Ask about this when booking your ticket, or get your hotel to arrange it. I, as always, was traveling merely with my trusted Porsche wheelie.
On day of departure I arrived at the station with plenty of time. A little bird suggested I should have sandwich and drinks already in hand. This is important. Whereas food at German and Swiss stations (and some French) is superb, from my experience all you can get at Italian main-line termini is appalling fast food, for which long lines, and stacks of euros, are required.
I had therefore decided to use the travel time to have a tasting of local snacks. At Park Hyatt Milan, General Manager Claudio Ceccherelli has the natural movements of a star from the nearby La Scala - he even strides around purposefully when talking on the phone, one hand holding the phone to his ear, the other conducting an imaginary orchestra. What about local snacks? He began to wax lyrically about pizza with the freshest mozzarella but I settled for michetta integrale, air-full bread rolls made of whole-grain flour (one of the most famous michetta places in Milan, by the way, is the 24-hour Princi, which was founded by Rocco Princi in 1986, and his stores are designed by London-based architect Claudio Silvestrin,but that is by the way). So, take some light-light bread rolls, fill with tomatoes and your choice of ham and cheese, and pour over a little Oilala olive oil, Monocultivar Coratina da Agricoltura Biologica, Barletta BA. And do not forget to take some local fruit - the cherries were the size of small walnuts when I was there.
The train from Milan to Florence Santa Maria Novella, locally called Firenze SMN, was actually French - I wonder where it had come from on what must be, in entirety, a long journey? The first class carriage was immaculately clean. I had plenty of space to work, and blessed the below-window electric sockets, which take European two-prong plugs. All announcements from the guard were both in Italian and faultless English (how many American, Australian, Canadian or British trains would give announcements in Italian?). The washrooms were clean. There was a dining car, and Italians went there to eat which is a good sign. I was later to find that all these points, by the way, were standard on all the trains I took.
Despite a 20-minute unannounced stop enroute, we arrived in Florence exactly on schedule and my driver was waiting. Two days later, I was back at Firenze SMN, which is an incredibly boring building, like concrete shoe boxes.
Firenze SMN is scheduled to be connected by 2010 to the new Florence TAV highspeed station, being designed by Lord Norman Foster's Foster + Partners in conjunction with Lancietti Passaleva Giordo and Associates. But this is in the Italian-snail future. Right now you have to contend with a cramped interior with nowhere to sit down and absolutely no decent retail. I later found out that a group of architects known as Gruppo Toscano, which included Italo Gamerini and Giovanni Michelucci, designed Firenze SMN, one of the key works of 'Italian modernism', in 1932 (they should have been ashamed of themselves). Birds and others above would see an outline of the fascio littorio, the symbol of Mussolini's Fascist movement, and, indeed, Mussolini personally approved its design. Some visitors come specifically to pay homage to a memorial plaque near track eight: this remembers the train loads of Jews deported to concentration camps during World War II.
I continued my rail journey from Florence to Rome. This time I was going to eat Florentine. Villa San Michele provided me with schiacciata caprese sandwiches, and delicious and juicy black cherries. Schiacciata, which means 'pressed', is the flat bread of the region,
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dating back to the times of flour shortages when bakers pummelled the bread to make it go further. They then made dips in the surface, and poured in olive oil. Delicious! I had become addicted to schiacciata in the bread basket that came with breakfast on Villa San Michele's terrace a few hours earlier. Well, after a run up the hill to Fiesole village, and a workout in the bijou 24-hour Technogym, what a luxury way to start a day, sitting on that terrace, high above a 2,000-year old road and looking far down to Florence's terracotta rooftops, dominated by the Duomo, designed by Filippo Brunelleschi 1377 –1446. Then, I had my schiacciata with sharp freshly squeezed orange juice, fabulously flavorful coffee and fresh ricotta. Now my sandwiches were filled with absolutely-ripe tomato slices and local mozzarella. I watched the countryside spin by, and continued reading Colin Thubron's outstanding In Siberia. A couple of senior priests were among my travel companions. We arrived on time and I quickly picked up a taxi.
It was hot, nearly a hundred degrees in fact. If I had thought ahead, I might have reserved a tour of Pope Innocent VIII's Vatican Gardens (Tuesdays, Thursday, Saturdays, via visiteguidate.musei@scv.va) but it would have been just too hot, anyway. I walked down the 132 stages of the Spanish steps, each stone polished mirror-smooth by centuries of travelers. Today it was so hot you could fry an egg on them and down in Piazza di Spagna, at the base, people frolicked in the fountain and refilled their water bottles. Defying the heat, I trekked down via Condotti and checked out the cakes (looking as good as Melbourne Cup hats) at the vintage-1760 Caffè Greco. The scrum around the Trevi Fountain included far too many English-speaking tourists who looked like exhausted whales. I made it back, up all 132 steps and past two paltry green bushes that constitute the only decoration outside the iconic hotel at the top of the Spanish Steps, and home to Hotel Eden, my blissful base for this night.
That evening, a fierce conversation ensued, thanks to second glasses of Louis Roederer, carefully poured by sommelier Paolo De Cicco, and exquisite canapés from chef Adriano Cavagnini, at the sixth floor rooftop closed-bar of Hotel Eden. The protagonists were Raffaella Palombelli, American Express' Head of Quality & Customer Service, Consumer Travel, Italy, and Marcel Levy, that epitome of style who so exquisitely manages The Eden. What was a typical sandwich? It seemed it is not only go-Rome but go-area, go-street. I was going to need more time than I had to investigate the prosciutto from every mini-quarter of the city. Your ham, anyway, needs to come with focaccia and ricotta. We went downstairs, passed Hotel Eden's Brioni vitrine, in its main hall, and went on for dinner.
The following morning dawned, already hot. Room 201 has its own lovely terrace, overlooked by the 15th century buildings that are now the Swiss College so I felt it appropriate at least to have on a bikini to do my morning exercises (you do not want to shock those Swiss students). I put a bathtowel down on the wide expanse of terracotta flooring and breathed in jasmine perfume from the adjacent planters. Then I did a quick check of the Borghese Gardens. The original palace, the Galleria Borghese, is pristine after its restoration. It gleams in the morning sun. After a shower, it was quickly up to the rooftop of Hotel Eden for another of the world's best breakfast buffets. The fruits included both mango and papaya, and lots of red and black berries, and I adored the ricotta, and the bright yellow juice. Then, thanks to the Hotel's Eden BMW-7 Series, it was back to continue my train odyssey (as I left the hotel, the florist, a Brad Pitt lookalike if ever there was one, handed me a perfect white rose from the bunch he was carrying).
Rome Termini main station, also known as Stazione di Roma Termini or Stazione Termini after the nearby Roman thermae, Baths of Diocletian, is dedicated to Pope John Paul II - what would His Holiness say if he knew it is nicknamed 'the dinosaur'? The current building, with a modernist travertine facade and reinforced concrete roof, was designed in 1947 by Leo Calini, Vasco Fadigati, Eugenio Montuori, Achille Pintonello and Annibale Vitellozzi. An earlier Pope, Pius IX, had opened the first Rome Termini station, designed by Salvaore Bianchi, in 1863: this was demolished in 1937 in readiness for the 1942 World's Fair, which was never held because of World War II. This station today has the best facilities I have seen so far. The splendid retail includes a store selling day-glo beachwear that, for those with more time, must surely prove irresistible. If you want a panini, you are spoiled for choice, here - the most enticing were those at Panino. Nearby VyTA has a selection of focaccia sandwiches, all of four by three inches and two inches high, packed in with goodies, say pizza ripena praga, with mozzarella.
This next train, Rome to Milan via Florence and Bologna, is full. Someone is in my seat so I take the solo seat behind and hope for the best. We pull out on time, but five minutes later stop. There is a brick wall one side but I look out at tracks covered in weeds. In the distance, only In Italy, flat-roofed pale red brick buildings either still going up or being pulled down, whichever, with too much graffiti, and a tangle of telephone wires overhead.. We start moving again, I write nonstop. This train has onboard stewards, from Chef Express. They are neatly uniformed, they work at lightning speed. First they come along with newspapers. Their second trolley has a selection of non-alcoholic beverages and really excellent strong Italian coffee - all this is complimentary, by the way. I had barely finished my coffee when one of the guys was back, with boiled sweets. This particular leg was just under four hours and we had three beverages trolleys in all. We arrived absolutely on time, and, back in Milan, I followed the clear signs for the Metro. I cannot wait for my next Trenitalia rail pass!
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