Bayern pass

We just used the Bayern Tickets on several days for our group of 14. It's definitely the cheapest way to travel. Buy them from the red ticket machine boxes in the train stations or the U-Bahn stations. You get to choose if what day you want to use the ticket so you can buy them today for travel tomorrow or next week. It's a great deal that not everyone seems to know about. We met a husband and wife who used a whole day of their Eurail Passes to go to Neuschwanstein and back. They could have just spent 29 Euro total instead of a whole day wasted from their Pass. They then had to purchase another whole ticket to get to Frankfurt because they exhausted their Eurail Pass.

The Bayern is what you want. You can buy it at the Munich station. If it is a round trip buy it at the same time or you can buy it at the Salzburg station. We have taken that route and used the Bayern ticket. We also used the Bayern ticket from Munich to the Czech border.

http://www.bahn.de/i/view/GBR/en/prices/germany/laender-ticket.shtml

Scroll down to Bayern (Bavaria).

There are also other good deals on passes in Germany.

Complete information on the Bayern-Ticket is here.

It is a full day (midnight to 3 AM the following day weekends, after 9 AM workdays) on/off pass for all regional trains in Bavaria. The cost is €28 from an automat, €30 from a counter.

If you are going from Munich to Salzburg and back in a single day, you only have to buy one in Munich before you go.

I'm not absolutely sure, but I think tickets from an U-Bahn station automat are printed without a date and have to be "canceled" before using. If they say "Hier entwerten" on one end, put that end, that side up, in one of the ticket canceling machines at the entrance to the station the day you use it.

They have a date printed on them. Actually you must choose the date you want from the machine before the tickets will be dispensed.

Tim, in what U-Bahn station did you purchase a Bayern-Ticket that did not have to be canceled?

I think it might have actually been an S-Bahn station. All underground trains are not necessarily U-Bahn (See map). The S-bahn in Munich does run underground through town, but that doesn't make it a U-Bahn. The U-Bahn is a conveyance of the local transit district (Verkehrsverbund); the S-Bahn is a regional train of the Bahn.

Please read this, under Hinweise ("tips") from the MVV website.

"Vergessen Sie nicht Ihr Bayern-Ticket vor Fahrtantritt zu entwerten, wenn Sie das Bayern-Tickets über die Automaten an U-Bahnstationen oder über die MVG-Kundencenter und -Verkaufsstellen gekauft haben.

"Bayern-Tickets aus den Automaten an S-Bahn-Stationen und den Fahrscheindruckern im Regionalen Busverkehr werden bereits entwertet ausgegeben. Sie sind nicht für den Vorverkauf geeignet."

I think the last sentence, "They are not suitable for pre-purchase", refers to Bayern-Ticket purchased on a bus, because the bus machine only prints that day's date. As Tim says, Bayern-Tickets purchased from an S-Bahn Automat allow you to pick any date in advance.

BTW, that tips section of the MVV website said,

"Don't forget to cancel your Bayern-Ticket before start of travel if you bought the Bayern-Tickets at the automats at the U-Bahn stations or at the MVG Customer Center and Sales Locations.

"Bayern-Tickets from the automats at S-Bahn stations and from the ticket printers in Regional buses are issued already canceled [meaning already date stamped]. They [bus printed tickets] are not suitable for advance purchase."

BTW, a few years ago I was curious about whether you could purchase a Bayern-Ticket on a bus (important if a bus leg was the first leg on a long trip where you could use the B-T), so I wrote to MVV. They wrote back that you could but you must have exact change. I don't know if this (exact change) is still true, or not. If you give the bus driver a 10 and a 20, he only has to give you a €2 coin. If you give him a 50, €22 change might be a problem.