Need help with rail pass vs. individual tickets - with specific itinerary

The individual ticket prices also seem to differ from the estimates found on Rick Steves website.

No surprise here. Your 1st mistake is using the Eurorail website. They don't show all the trains, and they add on a significant surcharge for most of the trips they do show.

Use the national rail websites, or a 3rd party without a markup such as https://www.captaintrain.com Schedules and prices are usually only listed 90 days or so out (varies by rail company). Next July is too far away, so just use a convenient date in January to get price estimates and add them up. You can also use a site such as rome2rio.com for price estimates, less precise but it will give you an idea.

Then call RS to see what a rail pass would cost.

Or you could just use a handy rule of thumb: railpasses haven't been a bargain for about a generation. The days of traipsing around Europe all summer on a cheap railpass are relics just like film cameras and vinyl records. The prices are high, especially for travel within a country (I don't think anyone has ever come up with a realistic itinerary within Italy in which a railpass saves money). If you are taking any hi-speed lines you'll find another unpleasant surprise. You need a separate reservation that is not part of your railpass, sometimes requiring a surcharge, and always limited in number (eg. there may be seats available on the train at times you want, but not for railpass customers).

The RS book shows full fair prices, so they are the highest possible estimates. You generally can save significantly by purchasing individual tickets well in advance of your trip, although the least expensive tickets do not allow any changes or refunds. Train travel in Italy is relatively inexpensive and you will almost certainly do better buying individual tickets. Finally, for short day trips, using pass segments makes little sense. However, the only way to know for certain is to price each segment and compare total to cost of a pass. Use the relevant national websites to price the segments.

The RS book shows full fair prices, so they are the highest possible estimates.

Sherry, I'm going to go out on a limb and bet the prices the OP is finding on the RailEurope site are much higher than the full-fare ones in the RS book.

Brett,
You've received sound advise by the others thus far.

You may find it helpful to search this website:http://tinyurl.com/seat61-Railpass-or-not

You may want to search the following official railways websites for specific countries:

• Germany: http://www.bahn.com
• Switzerland: http://www.sbb.ch/en/home.html
• Italy: http://www.trenitalia.com

You may be able to save money by booking your train tickets in advance.

You may also consider flying from Rome to Bern.

Hope this helps!

Brett,

I just realized that you have a duplicate posting, so you may want to delete one of them so you will keep all your replies on one thread.

Your itinerary is very ambitious IMHO...

You will be covering much ground & will be spending 8 days traveling long distances (Munich => Graz; Graz => Milan; Rome=>Bern & Bern => Munich ) to get from point A to point B.

Sometimes less is more... less destinations with more days in each destination.

Keep in mind that 2 nights is equivalent to 1 full day, 3 nights = 2 full days, etc, etc...

Also each time you change destinations, you will lose at least half to a whole day just traveling.

It's definitely a whirlwind type of trip!

As others have stated, you travel dates are too far out to know the best price but considering you will only travel 8 days that comes to $73.62 per person per travel day. Looking at Graz to Milan prices (your most expensive leg) 80-90 days out the saver fare for the night train is only 39.40€ plus 20€ for a couchette reservation.

Short story is the rail pass won't be worth it if you plan ahead and book your point to point rail tickets when they are available from the individual rail companies 60-90 days out.

For Graz to Milan by plane you may want to look into a round trip flight from Munich to Graz then a one way from Munich to Milan. You will connect thru Munich anyway but the one way price from Graz to Milan is almost $400 whereas round trip MUC-GRZ is under $200 and one way MUC-MXP is under $100. If you are going to fly that leg you will save money and some time adding the MUC-GRZ leg. The only catch is you'll have to deal with two different airlines.

DJ

"Your 1st mistake is using the Eurorail website."

You can't be using the Eurail website. It doesn't give P-P ticket prices (or sell those tickets). You must be looking at RailEurope, which is not a good place to get prices. Although RailEurope sells individual tickets, they are a travel agency that marks up tickets above the price you would pay at a rail station in Europe or online from one of the national rail lines in Europe.

Rick's charts are misleading (sorry ETBD). They use full fare prices, for the most expensive trains, 2nd class, and are based on the $/€ exchange rate at the time they were created. His charts don't change when the exchange rate changes. You can get far better prices buying advance purchase, discount tickets or using regional passes.

Ex: today, two people can travel from Munich to Salzburg with an advance purchase ticket for 38€ (~$41), or for 28€ (a little over $30) with a Bayern-Ticket. The Bayern-Ticket takes less than 20 minutes longer but has no specific train requirement. Rick's table indicates $40 each. The price from RailEurope for an express train with similar restrictions to an advance purchase tickets is $66 for 2; the RailEurope price for a full fare ticket on regional trains with no restrictions is $83 for two.

We booked point-point tickets, purchased them as soon as the became available, and saved a bundle. We booked almost all tickets on the train company website.

brett,

"Your 1st mistake is using the Eurorail website."

I agree! Using Rail Europe or whatever to research rail trips or buy tickets is not the best idea. If you want to research rail trips, use the bahn.de (German Rail website) which covers rail lines all over Europe. If you want to pre-purchase tickets for travel in Germany, Italy or France, use the www.capitainetrain.com website. For travel in Austria, you can either buy tickets at local stations or from öbb.at (buying tickets locally can be done in all countries, either from a Kiosk or a staffed ticket office).

Especially for travel in Italy, Railpasses are rarely cost effective as trains are relatively inexpensive, especially when discounted tickets are purchased well in advance. Another point to keep in mind is that Railpasses do not include the seat reservation fees that are compulsory on the fast trains. You'd need to pay those separately and even if with a Railpass, if you're caught without a valid reservation hefty fines will be the likely outcome (fines are collected on the spot).

Could you elaborate on your stop at La Spezia. Is that in fact the location you want to visit? If you're planning to visit the Cinque Terre instead, I'd recommend booking accommodations VERY early. You'll also need to decide which of the five towns you want to stay in.

A few thoughts on each of your rail trips.....

• Munich to Graz - the shortest trip on that route is about 6H. There is at least one direct train (no changes).
• Graz to Milan - the shortest trip on that route is 8H:55M, with the first leg via Bus. You'll probably find that there aren't many flight options from that area, so using the train will probably be your best (and cheapest) option. Note that your destination will be Milano Centrale.
• Milan to Parma - the shortest trip is 1H:09M via high speed Freccia train. There are also Regionale trains on that route. There are no price breaks on Regionale tickets so best just to buy those locally. However, BE SURE to validate them prior to boarding the train on the day of travel, or you'll risk hefty fines!
• Parma to La Spezia - I won't comment on that until clarifying whether that's your desired destination.
• La Spezia to Florence - Again, need more information. It's generally a very easy 3H or so trip, with one or two changes to Florence. Note that your destination station will be Firenze S.M. Novella.
• Florence to Rome - that's a very easy trip, about 90 minutes via high speed Freccia or Italo trains. Your departure station will be Firenze S.M. Novella and your arrival station will be Roma Termini.
• Rome to Bern - the shortest trip on that route appears to be a reasonable 6H:23M (that's for a departure at 08:00), with one change at Milano Centrale.
• Bern to Munich - the shortest trip appears to be 5H:26M, with one change at Zürich Hbf.

Your proposed Itinerary is somewhat "busy" but certainly possible. You'll need to be clear on the stations you'll be using for each segment of your trips, as most cities have more than one station.

Good luck with your planning!

Additional comments are on the duplicate question under Italy.

I answered this on the Italy forum but will post it again in case that thread gets deleted.

Have you priced out the point to point tickets for the Italy part of your trip?

Milan - Parma= 9.00 and up
Parma- La Spezia= 11.25 and up
La Spezia- Florence= 13.50 and up
Florence to Rome= 19.00 and up
Rome to Bern= 58 euros and up

These prices are for advanced purchase and are for each person. There will be no additional seat reservation charges like there will be with a rail pass. So your Italy section of the trip could cost as little as 221 euros.

If you look at the bahn.de site you can get trains from Munich to Graz for as little as 29 euros each and from Bern to Munich for as little as 49 euros each. The only segment I couldn't price was the Graz to Milan section. So far that's a total of 377 euros for booking point to point tickets for the two of you. These are second class seats, which are fine especially for shorter trips like the ones in Italy, with advanced purchase.

http://www.trenitalia.com/tcom-en

http://www.bahn.com/i/view/USA/en/index.shtml

Donna

Thanks so much for all the help! Sounds like individual tickets might be the way to go. Also sounds like we might need to take another look at the itinerary to see if it might be a good idea to pare it down a bit. We've got a few books coming from Rick Steves so that should help in the planning.

Thanks again!

Did you consider ...
Train: Munich >> Graz >> Bern >> Milan >> Parma >> La Spezia >> Florence >> Rome
Fly: Rome >> Munich

In this case I would buy P2P tickets for ...
Munich >> Graz >> Bern >> Milan
& Florence >> Rome
Buy walk up tickets for cheaper local Italian trains for the other legs.
Possibly break Graz to Bern with a stop at Innsbruck.

We're in Graz for the Austrian F1 race and we're trying to catch the Tour de France in Bern at the end if the trip so that's why we worked it out that way. We're going to take a look at the schedule again this weekend and see if we need to tweak it. We've thought about moving Milan later in the trip...possibly when we're going from Rome to Bern.

I thought you might have events scheduled.
My suggestion doesn't help then. Lol

From Graz
4/7 Venice (or Verona or Padova)
6/7 Parma
8/7 Rome
11/7 Florence
13/7 Cinque Terre
15/7 Milan
17/7 Bern

There are night train options from Austria to Italy as well.