French Riviera

Depending on which train you take, your reservations come with the tickets. Regional trains have a certain valid period, but no reservations, so you can just hop on with your ticket. But intercity trains and the fast trains usually require you to commit to a certain train and time when you buy it. You can confirm which ones require these reservations by visiting bahn.de, entering a route, and looking for the little white R in the red circle. That said, you should be able to purchase reservation-based tickets a day or two before you leave without a problem, although you may end up paying the premium price if all the advance-purchase cheap fares are sold out.

Yes.

You probably know that reservations are required for some trains--though not the local ones you are (I think) asking about.

Is the bahn.de, the best web site.
I find it does not give prices?
It symbols are hard to figure out.

So reservations come with the ticket, is that an extra cost?
After the Riviera I was thinking of ending up in Rome.
So again, would that be a matter of just going to a train station and buying a ticket?

I am just not certin the exact day I want to head there.

Thanks

No, the bahn.de site is the German national rail website and, while it has almost all European trains in its timetable database, it cannot display prices for trips that don't involve Germany. It is the best place to go to look for schedules....you had indicated you wanted to find out which needed reservations....and that's the white R inside the little red dot. For prices, go to www.voyages-sncf.com . It's difficult to get the English site to show up, but it't not really hard to follow in French. That'll show you schedules, routes, and prices, including the advance booking deals you can get. The prices you see will include the reservation cost, if there is one. As for the Riviera to Rome....rail links aren't terribly good and rather slow, so make sure you at least get a good sense of the timetables before you leave.

Thanks Norm
the German train site makes more sense

I have a tendency to try and do to much when I travel.

I have about 4 weeks. The first 2 are with a bunch of guys going on a Canadian miltray battle site tour.

Then I am on my own biking around Provence for 8 days.

After that I have about 5 days or so, I thought about seeing the Riveria. I have been to Italy before.

So maybe Rome is too much to fit in there.