Museo Ferrovario Piemontese and other day trips from Turin

[newmilton]

Turin is a city I know fairly well - one of my favourite Italian cities - but I've not explored the surrounding area much.

I'm off to the city for a couple of weeks to work on my Italian, and was wondering about day trips by rail (my lessons are in the morning but my afternoons will be free). I have come across the above museum, and wondered if it was worth a visit, but also if anyone had any other suggestions.

I'm thinking of small towns and countryside rather than cities, and in any case I've been to both Genoa and Milan; the only criterion is that they should be accessible by train.

Any ideas?

 

[eastwestdivide]

For countryside/mountains, apparently the line up to Aosta is worth a trip.
From a train point of view, I think they might be using electro-diesel / bimode trains now, if this link is correct:
https://www.railwaygazette.com/news...-view/view/electro-diesel-flirt-unveiled.html
On the other hand, you might need to brush up your French as well as your Italian as the Aosta region is predominantly French-speaking.
Bon voyage / buon viaggio

Edit: those Stadler bi-mode might not be in operation yet - journey planners still show a change of trains, and people on an Italian rail forum are also complaining about poor services/missed connections, here:
https://www.ferrovie.it/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=26040&start=2340

 

[newmilton]

My wife is French, and would have divorced me long ago if I hadn't learned the language ... so that's not a problem

 

[eastwestdivide]

Good to hear about the languages. First time I went to Turin, I had been learning French for much longer than Italian, and got very confused when a shop assistant replied to my Italian in French, thinking that I had a French accent!

Also, Asti isn't that far by train, for a smaller place to visit. Went there once for the mediaeval horse race tournament thing, the palio, but unfortunately you've missed it this year, as it was early September.

 

[JB_B]

+1 For Aosta ( and Ivrea on the way is also interesting - that's where we swapped to a DMU but it sounds as though this might have changed.)

I'd also recommend Cuneo which resembles a sort of mini-Torino higher up in foothills of the Alps. It's tiny in comparison but still boast kilometres of portici. It's famous for it's rum chocolates ( and rum+chocolate gelato.)

Continuing from Cuneo up to Limone and the border is quite scenic although there isn't much to Limone itself.

Also worth a look is Acqui Terme with it's natural hot springs - there are some great 1930's posters promoting the waters as highly radioactive.

The line south from Fossano to Savona is very scenic but probably more so on the Ligurian side.

 

[newmilton]

Thanks for the suggestions. I'm looking at combining a visit to the museum at Savigliano with a visit to Cuneo as they are both on the same line. Does anyone know about break-of-journey regulations on FS ... i.e., can I buy a ticket from Turin to Cuneo and hop off and on again at Savigliano, or do I need separate tickets?

Re Eastwestdivide, I was once in a restaurant in Florence with my sister and her husband (my wife wasn't with me), and had been speaking Italian to the staff. The gave my sister and her husband menus in English, and me a menu in French!

 

[eastwestdivide]

Thanks for the suggestions. I'm looking at combining a visit to the museum at Savigliano with a visit to Cuneo as they are both on the same line. Does anyone know about break-of-journey regulations on FS ... i.e., can I buy a ticket from Turin to Cuneo and hop off and on again at Savigliano, or do I need separate tickets?

Re Eastwestdivide, I was once in a restaurant in Florence with my sister and her husband (my wife wasn't with me), and had been speaking Italian to the staff. The gave my sister and her husband menus in English, and me a menu in French!

I think tourist area waiters have other skills. We sat outside at one restaurant, and the chap standing by the door to drum up custom greeted all passers-by in mostly the correct language purely by guessing from the way they dressed. Impressive, although he said it was easy.

On the break of journey/2 tickets thing - I'm pretty sure Italian regional (non-intercity/freccia) trains are on a tariff per km, so there's no particular benefit either way. However, I think the tickets that you have to validate (convalidare) in the machine before boarding have a validity of 4 hours or something from the time of stamping, so you might be better off with separate tickets for the two legs.
All IC and Frecciarossa/bianco/argento are reservation-only, no break of journey.

 

[newmilton]

I think the tickets that you have to validate (convalidare) in the machine before boarding have a validity of 4 hours or something from the time of stamping, so you might be better off with separate tickets for the two legs.

Ah yes, I remember the four hour rule. They will all be local trains (some of them GTT rather than FS I believe), so separate tickets is probably the way to do it. Thanks again.

 

[JB_B]

Ah yes, I remember the four hour rule. ...

4h validity is the norm for FS regional tickets but I've recently seen 150m and 90m so it's worth checking.