transport

Two choices - deep discount airlines purchased well in advance with strict attention to their rules or advance purchase, deep discount rail tickets. Venice to Rome can be as cheap as about 10E. And, of course, the Regional trains are very cheap. About like hitch hiking.

I looked at the Euro rail page here and it is so complicated. I am taking my first trip next week and I know how to do the local train from Rome to Bari.. That is all I ne3ed this time.. But we have found 2 cruises we want to do next year.. One does Ireland and Brit Isles ends in Hamburg or Amsterdam.. The other does France and Italy.. But need to get on it in Italy,, Just planning ahead.. silly me michelle

Don't start in London. From Amsterdam, you can get a night train to Munich for very low advance purchase discount fares; the same for Munich to Italy.

Your big problem is "Euro rail" page - whatever that is. If you just want schedule information bahn.de is a good choice.

Michelle as said,, flying really can be cheap cheap,, but not for anyone travelling next week,, even getting good prices for rail is too late..
Best prices for most transport options are to book well in advance..

Cheap flights are the way to go when you have a long leg, everything else is too expensive and time consuming. I plan around long legs so it's not something I normally have to worry about, you may have to skip normal airline search engines in favor of the cheap carrier's websites.

The bahn page for schedules is here. Be wary of cheap airlines, particularly RyanAir. RyanAir uses remote air fields, usually not the major one for a town. Rarely is there rail service to the airport, just buses. You'll spend lots of time and money getting to/from their airports.

Funny thing about Ryanair: when I flew with them last month, we flew right to El Prat, Barcelona's main airport, when I really would have preferred Girona. Sometimes the more distant towns are where you want to be anyway.