Prague via Rail to Berlin

You can book tickets directly at the German Railways at www.bahn.de.
Also take a look at the Man in Seat 61 for all things rail. http://www.seat61.com/trains-and-routes/berlin-to-prague-by-train.htm#How_to_buy_tickets

The obvious place to stop between Prague and Berlin would be Dresden.

The German Railways have a direct connection, leaving Prague every two hours and taking some 4,5 hours. See schedule at www.bahn.de/p/view/service/index.shtml (English language button).
Buy your tickets some two months before at this website, and you can probably get heavily discounted tickets (EUR 19,90 or 29,90). The proces is simple: payment by credit card and a pdf for printing at home.

Hi,

I would suggest on the way back to get off at Dresden Hbf, spend a night or two, and also take the S-Bahn from Dresden Hbf to see Meissen...all depends on your time schedule.

I traveled from Berlin to Prague by train a couple of years ago. As indicated in another reply, it's easy to get discounted tickets in advance, buying them online with a credit card, printing them out at home. You'll be warned that you must have with you, at time of travel, the exact credit card that you used to make the purchase. My card had expired after the purchase, and was replaced with a new one, but I remembered not to throw out the expired card. I put it in my wallet so I'd have it with me on the trip. Good thing, because I was asked to show it along with our tickets and it was carefully inspected. My husband and I were traveling with our daughter and her boyfriend and we had paid for all 4 of the tickets. A few days later, my daughter and her boyfriend traveled by themselves on a train back to Berlin, using tickets my daughter had purchased online with her own credit card, and she had forgotten to to bring her credit card along. When she was unable to display it, a fine was imposed but my daughter, who was temporarily living in Berlin, asked if she could avoid the penalty by later displaying her credit card. The conductor had to be talked into this. He reluctantly agreed. It was a hassle for her to have to return to the train station with it, and wait to see someone in the office, but this worked.

If you want to stop in Dresden, even overnight, on the way from Prague to Berlin, build it into the Savings Fare ticket when you book it online and use the stopover function. Then, you can still get Prague to Berlin for 19,90€. However, you will have to make the specified train (another EC, probably) from Dresden to Berllin.

For another 5 or 10 euro, you can use the Mode of Transport function to specify a regional connection from Dresden to Berlin and then, according to the Vor- und Nachlauf rule, use any regional trains to Berlin, as long as you get there by 10 am the next morning.

thanks for all the info you gave us..we really appreciate it..looking forward to our trip next year

In 2012 I took this route part of the way (Berlin to Dresden and Dresden to Berlin a few days later). On this Forum, someone recommended getting seat reservations for these trains (they're optional on these routes, but cheap). I'm very glad I followed this advice. Particularly on the Dresden to Berlin leg, the train was quite full, and people were sitting on their luggage in the passageway. But with seat reservations, my mother and I just went to our reserved seats and stowed our bags overhead.

You'll be warned that you must have with you, at time of travel, the exact credit card that you used to make the purchase.

That's no longer true. You simply need any piece of identity.

The Bohemian Switzerland and Saxony Switerzland national parks on the Czech-German border are really worth exploring. There are some fantastic rock formations, idyllic boat rides on small rivers and great hiking. The castle in the small Czech town of Decin is worth a look in too.

I had the credit card issue myself last May en route from Prague to Dresden to Leipzig to Dessau. Fidelity had issued me a new card with a new number after I had bought the ticket using the old one and then cut it up and thrown it away. There was no problem while I was on the Czech portion of the trip; they couldn't have cared less that the numbers didn't match. But the conductor on DB was very nonplussed, and kept saying "das is ein problem!". I was afraid that I'd be thrown off the train or at least charged for a new ticket. I had brought along my credit card statement showing the purchase several months earlier, but that didn't seem to make much of an impression. Finally the conductor gave up and walked on down the aisle, but when I got off the train in Leipzig, I noticed her talking to another staff person and pointing to me (I avoided eye contact and kept moving). So I'm happy if this particular bit of Teutonic rigidity has been abandoned. Fair enough to expect an ID, but credit card numbers do change.

I had a similar situation like that but with a EuroStar ticket I bought on-line with a credit card. Before I got to London, the bank cancelled my credit card, sent me a new one, obviously with new account numbers. I didn't destroy the old card, brought both cards along on the trip to show if required. In your case I would have brought both cards to show, exactly what DB would have expected, nothing to do with rigidity at all.