My sister and I are planning a month long trip in Europe, with flight into Oslo and flight home from Frankfurt. Our goal is to spend time in Norway, Amsterdam, Switzerland , Italy (Cinque Terre and Florence) and Germany (Munich). We are trying to plan how long in each country and how we are going to travel to each. Originally we were thinking Norway to Amsterdam(plane), Amsterdam to Switzerland, Switzerland to Italy, and finally Italy to Germany. However, looking at Eurail, it looks like a train ride from Ams to Switz and Italy to Germany means a stop in another country. We do not object to going to other countries, but with the limited amount of time and money and all the places we want to go, we would love some input on how we can save time and/or money with traveling from country to country. Another problem is that 5-country Eurail pass would not be enough if we had to go through France and Austria. Thanks for your help!
Posted by
Vernon, Canada
32212 posts
Jenna, To begin with, which resource / website are you using to plan your rail trips? DON'T use RailEurope for that! The German rail site, bahn.de is one of the best ways to determine accurate information on rail trips. WHERE in Switzerland are you planning to visit? If this is your first trip to Europe, I'd highly recommend pre-reading Europe Through The Back Door during your planning (especially the rail skills chapter). You may also find it helpful to download the free PDF Rail Guide from this website (click the "Railpasses" tab at the top, and then look in the lower right corner). To provide some examples on your travel times, using Amsterdam Centraal and Interlaken Ost for example, the shortest trip I could find was 8H:53M, with one change in Basel. Which method of travel to use will depend on where you're going in Switzerland? One thing to keep in mind regarding Railpasses, is that these DON'T include the reservation fees that are compulsory on some trains (usually high speed such as the TGV in France). You'll have to pay "out of pocket" for those. If you decide that a Railpass is the best option (after comparing the costs of P-P vs. Railpass), travelling through countries not covered by the Pass is not a huge problem. You'll just have to buy a P-P ticket for the portion that's not covered. I've found that using a combination of a Railpass for longer (and more expensive) trips and P-P tickets for shorter trips seems to work well. Good luck with your planning!
Posted by
washington, DC
27 posts
Hi Jenna, Probably the cheapest, fastest way to get from Amsterdam to Switzerland would be to take a train from Amsterdam to Eindhoven, then fly Ryanair to Milan and catch a train back to Switzerland - a couple short train trips and a flight would be faster and cheaper than a long train journey. Traveling from Italy to Munich, I recommend taking a train from Florence to Venice, and then from Venice to Munich. I think you would have to book the two trips separately, but there are trips from Venice to Munich that stop in Austria, but don't require a change - and it's also one of the most beautiful train journeys over the Alps in Europe. If you take an early morning train to Venice, and an afternoon train to Munich, you would have 2-3 hours to explore Venice - very doable. If time/money is most important, fly Ryanair from Pisa to Frankfurt and then catch a train to Munich from there. Ryanair flys into a small airport about 100km west of Frankfurt, but you can catch a shuttle bus to several local train stations (or all the way to Frankfurt). There are other discount airlines in Europe, but Ryanair is the only one I've used and can recommend with confidence. Over the years, I have found it is often both faster and cheaper to fly than to take trains. www.ryanair.com Have fun! Karen