After high school I went to visit friends on the Adriatic coast of Italy, then we went to the Aeolian Islands (we summited Stromboli which may not be allowed an

After high school I went to visit friends on the Adriatic coast of Italy, then we went to the Aeolian Islands (we summited Stromboli which may not be allowed anymore). Anyway, I had very little money so I took a flight that was an option to fly from the "west coast of the US" to "western Europe". I waited for a nearby US departure since, our ground transportation is difficult, but flew into Paris, then took an overnight train to Bologna. When I left, I departed from Milan. The difficult part was that the shady company organizing the tickets told me the wrong Milan airport, but getting to Milan is easy. You could even take a train from Messina, since the train itself gets on the ferry from Sicily to the Italian peninsula. From Rome, Milan is only a three hour train ride with spacious seating and large windows to watch the scenery roll by. If you're on a tight budget with a flexible schedule, you can go a pretty long distance by train before it seems like any inconvenience at all.