Hi,
Will be traveling by train from Prague to Vienna (and then Vienna to Munich) in August 2013 with 3 other people. We will have a rail pass, but am wondering whether a seat reservation would be a good idea or not needed? Travel Prague to Vienna will be early morning weekday. Vienna to Munich will be Friday morning. Hope to get on non-stop trains for both trips. Are these trains usually crowded...do we need seat reservations or no? Thanks!
I assume you mean direct, the trains do make intermediate stops. Since it is a group of 4, you can be at the station when they spot the train and grab 4 seats together, or get advance seat reservations and be done with it. The EC and Railjet trains indicate "Reservation Optional".
Are you sure you want a rail pass? You can travel from Prague to Vienna for about 20 Euros and from Vienna to Salzburg for 20 Euros. As mentioned above, there are direct trains, but they do make stops. Many prefer the bus from Prague to Vienna as it is faster and offers more amenities. Orangeways and Student Agency are the two bus options.
Thanks for the feedback. We have a railpass as there are other trips/countries on our itinerary. Just trying to get a feel for whether these particular routes are "usually" really crowded or not.
Actually, the RailJet (RJ) does go non-stop between Salzburg and Munich (it's an Austrian Train, so it can't carry passenger between stops in Germany). The RailJets do make a couple of stops (St. Pölten, Linz, Salzburg) in Austria before going non-stop to Munich. It looks like the RJ is the only direct (no train changes) train all the way from Vienna to Munich. Find scheddules on the German Rail (Bahn) website.