Hi,
Our exact itinerary as we travel from Venice to Interlaken is still being finalized. eg we may go from venice to milan late afternoon or the following morning.
how far in advance should I purchase my tickets?
I was hoping to simply purchase when we arrive at the station ( via the app?)
You can save money if you can buy them in advance- up to 120 days- at www.ItaliaRail.com
Be careful with ItaliaRail as it is basically a travel agency selling tickets. Italian trains are operated by trenitalia.com and I would buy my tickets on their site. Nothing wrong with ItaliaRail but it is a third party ticket seller. Discount tickets on Italian railroads are limited in quantity, go on sale early and generally sell out quickly. The discounts tickets come with heavy restrictions and no flexibility.
yes, I have the official TrenItalia app. thx for calling that out..
I am more interested in last minute availability vs potential discounts.. so just wanted to see if these tickets get sold out etc.. I am assuming not.. but with the heavy travel rush in Europe, wanted to get some opinions here
We tend to book train tickets within a day or two of departure and have never found a sold out train. We are careful around the holidays. When we were in Germany and headed to Prague the day after Christmas, we did make sure we booked those ticket about 8 weeks out. But other than something similar I would not worry about sold out trains. Capacity is huge and schedules are frequent.
as long as you are happy paying top price you'll be fine
Hi, quick update on my train travels from Venice to Interlaken, in case it helps anyone.
Venice to Milan: Using the Trenitalia app, we purchased business class tickets the day before departure. Cost for adult: $64, child: 32
From Milan to Interlaken:
We had purchased the Swiss Pass. But based in what I had read and as others above have noted , the Swiss Pass cant be used for journeys originating outside of Switzerland.
So we purchased a business ticket from Milan to Birg ($57).
At Birg, we changed to a SBB train to Spiez, which was covered by the Swiss Pass. It was a bit tight - only 3 min between our train arriving at Birg and the next one leaving to Spiez. But worked out just fine.
ps: we were using the SBB app, and had connected our Swiss Pass to it.
And from Spiez we went on to Interlaken/Lauterbrunne/Murren - all of which was covered by Swiss Pass.
And final note - we used Google maps - it even has train times and platforms. Super convenient.
Thanks everyone for the help in planning for our trip.
