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Lisbon to Madrid Trenhotel Lusitania

I am trying to book the overnight Trenhotel from Lisbon to Madrid for a family trip next summer, but am coming up empty handed as all of the websites seem to not sell reservations yet. Is it simply not possible to buy them this far in advance? Does anyone know when they might be on sale?

Posted by
293 posts

Hello,

I took that train back in 2016 and usually booking doesn't open up until 60 or so days before. I would set an alert on my phone to look again in the spring.

Caroline

Posted by
362 posts

www.seat61.com is a wealth of information as to train travel all over the world.

The latest from them is that Madrid/Lisbon overnight train has been permanently discontinued.

https://www.seat61.com/Portugal.htm

If you scroll down that page you can see descriptions of other possible rail journeys between the two cities.

Posted by
26840 posts

It's too bad about that night train, but those are rarely very restful. I'm not a fan of mid-trip flights, but this is probably time for one. There seem to be multiple non-stop flights daily between Lisbon and Madrid, and the fares I saw for June were very low. The fares are likely to escalate signficantly as the travel date approaches, so you'll need to balance that against the current cancelation policies and the potential risk of buying tickets way in advance during COVID times. You may run into checked-luggage fees and/or very restrictive size and weight limits for carry-on bags, so that's something to check carefully before booking. The luggage rules may not be the same for all airlines.

I use skyscanner.com to check intra-European flight schedules. Buy your tickets from the airline's website.

Posted by
6788 posts

That particular train wasn't a restful trip. I took in in 2018 or 19 from Hendaye to Lisbon (same rolling stock, same route after mid-point), and the condition of the track is quite bad so there was a lot of jolting from side to side. It didn't matter too much because we just had beach time ahead of us, but it would have impacted us for a day of sightseeing.
The cod we had on the train was the best of the whole trip though!