Hello everyone,
My friend and I are planning a eurotrip and we were thinking of getting the eurail pass after seeing that it would benefit us. One thing I was wondering about though was how reservations are made with the pass. I am very confused about this. Any help is welcome!
Thanks in advance.
Forget the reservation issue for now. First of all, you need to determine if a 3rd party rail pass will be cost-efficient. For almost all travelers, it isn't, and is actually one of the most expensive methods of traveling. Don't compare rail ticket prices quoted by Eurail, Rail Europe or any other ticket reseller (including the owner of this website) to the cost of the rail pass, because there's a whole lot they don't tell you, like advanced purchase discounts, regional passes, day passes, etc. Here's what to do... go to the websites of the national rail carriers in the countries through which you plan to travel. Example, Deutsche Bahn for Germany, SNCF for France, SBB for Switzerland. These will give you a much more accurate estimate of rail ticket costs. For an overall tutorial relatively free of commercial bias, goes to this website.
Tom is, as always, right on the money.
This helpline has plenty of travel experts who can help you find definitive answers, including the cheapest and most convenient way to travel by train.
What you need in reservations depends on how many, where and when, and what level of comfort, you travel.
Would you fill us in a little of the detail please?
Be careful using the SBB website for prices. It will assume that you have a discount card and show prices at half what you will pay if you don't set the options right.
There are a few instances where a railpass is a good idea, but mostly they are more expensive and especially so when reservations are added on top, along with all the restrictions on passholders being able to get reservations.
Please give us the information to be able to help...
'One thing I was wondering about though was how reservations are made with the pass.' - You read the terms and conditions of use.
As above, if your money matters, depending on your style of travel, where you go, etc., it could very likely you will be making a mistake in purchasing any pass unless you compare the alternatives.
Ok, thanks for the responses so far! We were planning on buying a 5 country regional pass and use it for this route: Nice - Cinque Terre - Florence - Vienna - Prague - Berlin
We are starting from Nice in the first week of April.
I thought it would have been a no-brainer getting a eurail pass, would it not be the case with this route?
The "no brainer" is now that rail passes are usually more expensive than anything but buying full price 1st class tickets on the day of travel. Perhaps someone here will be nice enough to do the work for you, but probably not, so you need to crunch your own numbers, and decide if you can commit to buying tickets for specific trains in advanced. Here's the websites you'll need for your trip:
SNCF for France
Trenitalia for Italy
ÖBB for Austria
CD for the Czech Republic
Deutsche Bahn for Germany.
These sites may not have posted their fares and time tables for April yet, but if you enter a date, let's say, two months from now, they should provide a good estimate. Time tables and fares generally don't change much month-to-month.
PS, and if you haven't done it yet, go to the Man in Seat 61 to learn more.
Tom is correct about point to point tickets, but a rail pass can also be a good value if you are traveling over a long distance, and even better of you and your friend will always be traveling together using what is called a "saver pass". You can save 15% getting one instead of two individual rail passes. To explain, in September I took my wife and her mother to France for two weeks and purchased from RS a saver pass containing four rail days to be used over two months. It cost me $686, which was on sale (20% discount) in April when I bought it. We arrived in Paris and used the first day going from Paris to Bayeux. After renting a car there and turning it in at the Rouen train station six days later we took the TGV from Rouen to Avignon. Keeping in mind the rail pass cost, the SECOND CLASS fare "one way" from Rouen to Avignon was $205 per person, or $615 total. For my $686 we went from Paris to Bayeux, Rouen to Avignon and Avignon directly to the Charles DeGaulle airport. Since that only used three rail days we had one left to explore the French Riviera. All that said, if your trips are short distances point to point may be your best value. Now to answer your question, if you get a rail pass you can go to the online site of the issurer of the rail pass to book and pay for the reservation on line. They will mail the reservation to your home address. Keep in mind that reservations cost extra except in the UK where they are included in the price, although you still have to book the reservation in advance. Good luck.
"the SECOND CLASS fare "one way" from Rouen to Avignon was $205 per person"
Really???? Rail Europe, hardly the low cost ticket provider, shows the fare from Rouen to Avignon as $95 per person. Full fare from French Rail is undoubtedly lower than that, and I'm sure with advance purchase, you can get much lower. Nothing like padding the ticket price to make a rail pass look more attractive. And, the TGV has a passholder reservation fee ($16/person) in addition to the railpass.
Looks like with an advance purchase PREMS ticket, the fare can be as low as 40€ (about $55). If you subtract the passholder reservation fee, that's a net of $39 per person.
"5 country regional pass and use it for this route: Nice - Cinque Terre - Florence - Vienna - Prague - Berlin"
This is a 3 - 4 week trip I assume?
A Eurail pass (like a certain travel guru's hairstyle) is so 1993. One hint I can give you is that the Vienna to Prague leg is 29 Euros on www.oebb.at.
Ok, thanks everyone! I did end up buying point-to-point tickets for the ones I was able to!
Yes, it'll be about a month-long trip!
For some reason I wasn't able to buy tickets to any of the towns in Cinque Terre or from any of the towns in Cinque Terre online. I tried Trenitalia and it didn't work. I guess I'll have to buy those tickets in a station?
From Nice I thought you had to take the train to Pisa to get to Cinque Terra..have you looked on SNCF? From Pisa to Cinque Terra you will have to take a regional train and I don't think they sell tickets online that far in advance for those..
Nice is west of Cinque Terre, Pisa is east. From Nice you can go directly to Genoa, then Sestri Levante, then, for example, Vernazza. No need to go way east through Pisa.
But she's right on the other issue. Trains in the Cinque Terre are regional trains. No advance purchase are available on Trenitalia more than a week in advance. Advance purchase does not guarantee a seat. Just buy a ticket when you get there.
Like Lee said, you don't need to buy tickets in advance for a trip to Cinque Terre. They don't sell tickets more than a week in advance, and you'll be better off doing it at the station. (Make sure to validate the ticket!) For the fast trains on Trenitalia (the Freccias), you can find significant savings by purchasing the tickets early. For example, from Florence to Vienna you'll probably be going through Milan. On that trip it would be worth it to buy the tickets early and save a lot.
Got it, thank you everyone! I am so much better informed now. haha
