You probably don’t need much of an excuse to visit the Italian region of Friuli Venezia Giulia. In the country’s far north-eastern corner, between Venice and Austria, FVG has more than enough glittering turquoise seas, ancient archaeological sites and rolling vineyards to earn its spot among the best places to visit in Italy. It’s home to fascinating cities like Trieste and Udine, but also sun-plastered resort towns like Grado and Lignano Sabbiadore. It is, in short, pretty darn lush.
And if you’re tempted to visit, then you’ll struggle to find a better time than now. The region’s tourist board is looking to boost both tourism and sustainable travel by refunding the price of your train ticket to get there. That’s right, they’re essentially paying for you to visit.
In case a free train trip wasn’t enough to entice you to the region, the tourist board is also giving visitors discounts on loads of stuff, from museum tickets to public transport. That’ll come in the form of an FVGcard, which will be valid for the duration of your stay.
There are a few T&Cs attached to FVG’s new scheme. For starters, the trains must be domestic services (so you’ll need to sort your own train or plane to actually get to Italy) and booked as part of packages through state-run rail provider Trenitalia. Travellers must stay in the region for a minimum of two nights at participating hotels, and the refunds can only be redeemed at four tourist offices: Trieste, Udine, Grado and Lignano Sabbiadore. The refunds are being offered from now until May 31 2023 and you can find out all the details here.
And even if it’s not totally gratis, in these tough times the offer of free travel and cheap things to do make FVG a strong option for that 2023 Italy trip.
Did you see that Hong Kong will pay for your plane ticket to visit in 2023?
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