Taxi from Sorrento to Naples& Villafranche to St. Paul De Vence

[hdg]

How much should a taxi from the port of naples be? Also, how much should a taxi be from Villafranche to St. Paul de Vence?

[Hank]

You really need to be cautious if planning to use taxis in Europe. Taxis are quite expensive which is not surprising considering the strong Euro and $9 a gallon gasoline. From Naples to Sorrento is about 35 miles and takes about an hour to 1:15 depending on traffic. Italian taxis are local and will not give you a simple fare based on one-way. You will have to negotiate a price but you can expect they will want at least 150 Euros and perhaps more. Most simply hire a taxi for the entire day which can cost as much as 300 Euros. Multiply the Euros by 1.6 to convert to dollars and you will quickly see why its not a cheap way of travel. It is quite easy and pretty cheap to take the train from Naples to Sorrento. Another option is to catch a fast jet boat from Naples to Sorrento, although they only run a few times a day. The ferry terminal is an easy 10 min walk from the ship. From Villefranche to St Paul de Vence is about a 25 - 30 mile drive and takes about 45 min (if traffic is light). I cannot imagine a taxi driver doing this trip for less than 100 Euros and I suspect most would want even more since they would have trouble getting a return fare. You also will find that there are not a lot of taxis sitting around in Villefranche. The bottom line is that very few cruisers use taxis for these kind of drives unless they have a group of 4 (or more to split the cost). You might do better trying to arrange a car/driver on-line from one of many small tour companies that handle this kind of thing. By the way, there is a local bus route that runs from Nice's bus station to St Paul de Vence. You can get this bus in Nice or take the train to Cagnes sur Mer and catch the bus when it stops across the street. This line used to run about every 45 min (except on Sundays) but we have not used it in a few years. We tend to just rent a car and drive ourselves to whereever (car rentals generally cost about $100- $130 for a one day rental.

Hank

Hank

[hdg]

Hank

Thanks for much for your help.

[hdg]

Can you recommend a tour company in Villefranche - Revelation tours are all booked up. Also, do you recommend going to St. Paul De Vence and the to Cannes or going to Eze, Monoco and Monte Carlo with maybe a brief stop in Nice?

[Hank]

I cannot give you good help with tour companies since my wife and I have never used any tour in Europe (we do everything independently). But, you might want to search on some other internet cruise boards and you can probably get some results if you simply google Nice and tours. Villefranche is a relatively small community and most of the tour companies would come from nearby Nice. If you want to do things on your own, Nice, Eze and Monte Carlo make a nice day and are relatively close to the port. Since you have not yet been to Nice or Monte Carlo, I would not recommend Cannes since its much further and really does not offer as much as Nice. We do love St Paul de Vence, but without a car or car/driver it takes so long to get to the village that it will limit your other options. The one time I do recommend skipping other things for St Paul de Vence is on Sundays when most of the stuff in the larger cities are closed. The bottom line is that its impossible to see everything in a day (or even in a month) so its usually smart to spend more time in a few places rather than spend a few minutes each in many places.