Hi. Need your advice regarding the Eurail pass for our first family trip to Europe. We are 4, including 2 children of 6 and 9. Our Trip, by train, will be as below:
Paris 5 days, London (also visiting Liverpool) 5 days, via Paris to Nice 5 days, Bologna (also visting Florence and Venicia) 5 days, La Spezia (visiting Cinque Terre) 3 days and then 7 days remaining ( not yet planned)....maybe via Nice and back to Paris...or camping somewhere before returning to Paris.
Do you believe it is worth taking the Eurorail or purchasing normal train tickets? What about the reservation of seats?
Thanks beforehand
Posted by
Chicago
8021 posts
For a first family trip you should buy tickets since you can't just hop on and show the pass on the routes you have planned i.e.:
Paris to London
London to Paris to Nice
Nice to Bologna
La Spezia to Nice to Paris
You have to make seat reservations and there is no guarantee that there will be 4 available together in the same area of a train for your family especially if you are traveling in summer.
FYI; https://www.eurail.com/en/book-reservations/all-about-seat-reservations
Also rail travel in Italy is inexpensive compared to France and the U.K,
Posted by
Lake District, England
6534 posts
From Paris to London a pass holder reservation is €32 or 40 (2nd or 1st class respectively) and from Paris to Nice €12 in either class.
There are many warnings on this forum about how limited in number these passholder reservations are. That may or may not be true- all I will say is that at 10pm tonight (Friday, UK time) there are still pass holder reservations on all Eurostar services tomorrow, likewise for Paris to Nice and all your Italian trains.
London to Liverpool you don't need reservations.
Nice to Bologna- reservations are not needed from Nice to the border at Ventimiglia. For those parts of your journey in Italy typically they cost €20- again lots of availability tomorrow.
So whether it is worth it compared to point to point tickets is for you to price.
But if the above unscientific experiment is normally true Eurail may be worth it for flexibility.
In Italy reservations are typically €15 each, but Bologna to Venice can be done on regional trains at no extra cost as can Florence to La Spezia.
Posted by
Wengen
2032 posts
You buy an Eurail Pass if you want flexibility. Eurail (and Interrail, the EU variant) is good if you do not know in advance which trips you will make. It is usually cheaper than walk-up fares. I often use an Interrail pass for last minute trips to Germany for example. But book this trip 2 weeks in advance and the price drops to around 130.
For example, first class one way Interlaken - Wolfsburg (something I have to do on a semi regular basis) is 438,90. A 4 days pass is 359,- So that is a no brainer.
If you are going to do lots of long trips, and want to remain flexible a pass is a good idea. I one set out on a trip to a Normandy port to meat up with sailboat, and did not know which port I was going to end up in when left Wengen. And I did no know what port in Europe I would leave the boat at. There again I travelled on an Interrail pass.
The moment that your question however becomes "how do I reserve seats for train X 4 months from now with my Eurail pass" you should not have bought the pass really. It is not for people who plan trips a long time in advance. This because getting Eurail reservations is often only possible at the station, and because jus buying a ticket+reservation online is often not only cheaper, but easier as well.
Posted by
Bern, Switzerland
1001 posts
It is very difficult to give a definite answer on that. A pass is probably cheaper or at least equal to the standard cost of a ticket, but most operators are selling various discounted tickets that would be less than the standard price. However the discounted tickets might be limited in number or time period and you might not get one. Some trains also limit the number of passholders it carries on a single journey while other trains are already booked out and it does not matter which ticket you are planning to use.
So you really need to do the math to figure out which option is best for you in a given situation and if your calculation shows a winning route based on discounted tickets, then buy them ASAP and lock in that price. Otherwise assume you'll be paying the standard ticket in such situations when doing the math.
For example last April I wanted to do a trip from Switzerland through France to Spain. The price of the individual tickets was less than 150 Euros versus a pass at 255 Euros. The problem was I could not get those tickets as the trains were already fully booked and the alternative routes were costing over 300 Euro.
The pass is very convenient if you are using regional and local trains as you can just hop on and off. But if you are required to make reservations in anycase, it kind of looses it's appeal for me as you still have to do the admin to get the reservations.