Originally Posted by
Concerto
I think the reason that this hasn't sold like hot cakes is the issue of getting to Rome. For a start, there is much less choice of flights these days and unless you're coming from Milan you're going to have to spend the night at Fiumicino airport.
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If you stay in the immediate vicinity of the airport, it's all stupid prices. Not so far from the airport are some small towns (3 - 5.5km away) and hotels there may offer more sensible pricing (but still far far too much for what they are). But you're still going to have quite an expense with taxis getting to and from the airport. My go-to at FCO airport has always been the Hampton by Hilton, but 400 Euros? No way. I looked at a lot of dates around late September and early October, and it's constant stupid prices. I would have thought by then that things would have calmed down a bit. Looking at this, it's no wonder Air BnB has taken off the way it has and become such a problem.
Have you got any ideas or solutions, especially about the hotel cost problem? The only one that I can come up with, which is not so great in truth, is to start in Milan with a night in a hotel and catch the first ITA flight in the morning from Milan LIN airport. the 07h00 flight would get you to Rome FCO for around 08h20, giving you 2 hours to make the connection to the Etihad flight which leaves at 10h20. It's a bit risky, but it's the only way to keep the costs down IMO (and I am living in French speaking Switzerland so it is quite easy to reach Milan with the train). But if you miss the flight because ITA is late, you are stuffed anyway.
This is the problem about doing this fare in summer — Italia is never great with accommodations. And it is never great with chain groups, so if you insist on doing it on a chain group you're pretty much stuffed no matter where you go in Italy.
I did a night in one of the hotels at Parco Leonardo for 70 euros, which is one stop away by train, and usually the hotels there are catered for guests getting to Fiumicino airport, so they tend to offer shuttle bus services for a few quid cheaper than the train. That's what I did anyway. I'm looking at dates in August and it seems like it's averaging 70-80 pounds.
Personally I think living too near to FCO doesn't really help — what I did for this fare was fly into Pisa from the UK in the morning, spend half a day around, and then take the train down into Roma Termini, and then taking the regional train to Parco Leonardo, have dinner somewhere in the mall (I had IKEA meatball cravings so that was what I settled on), and then go to sleep for the AUH leg the next day. From French-speaking CH your best options is a longer trek on the train or a flight direct to FCO, either of which isn't great IMHO.