My sister and I will be visiting Europe for the first time this summer! We will be visiting Britain, France, Italy, and Spain and doing quite a bit of hopping from city to city. I feel pretty comfortable figuring out the best way to get from city to city. However, I'm a little confused about traveling within a city. Say I buy the BritRail pass which will get me from London to Bristol to Bath and back. Will that also allow me to travel around London for the three or four days we plan on spending there? Or is that a completely separate pass?
Posted by
Vernon, Canada
32329 posts
Summer, Having a Railpass will NOT provide transportation in cities (AFAIK). You'll have to buy separate tickets for that. For travel within London, you might consider getting an Oyster Card (deposit required but that is refunded when you return the card). The best Pass or tickets will vary depending on the city - which cities will you be visiting? As this is your first trip to Europe, I'd highly recommend reading Europe Through The Back Door prior to your trip. After that, use the country-specific Guidebooks to plan lodgings, sightseeing and transportation in each place you'll be visiting. You may also find it helpful to download a copy of Rick's Railpass Guide (click the "Railpasses" tab at the top of this page and then look in the lower right corner for the download link). Happy travels!
Posted by
London, United Kingdom
4684 posts
No, the Britrail pass does not cover local transport in London.
Posted by
OP
Bremen, IN, United States
2 posts
Ken, That's very helpful! I am about halfway through Rick's "Europe through the Back Door", but it didn't occur to me that he might have country specific books too. Our itinerary is still up in the air, though we're trying to get that nailed down this week. Some definite cities we'll be visiting though are London, Paris, Nice, Madrid, and Barcelona along with some northern Italian cities. Possibly some combination of Venice, Florence, Rome, and Pisa. We just graduated college so we're working on a pretty tight budget. I just want to make sure that we've got all of our bases covered so there aren't any nasty surprises when we get over there.
Posted by
Vernon, Canada
32329 posts
Summer, How long will your trip be? Visiting London, Paris, Nice, Madrid, Venice, Florence, Rome, and Pisa is going to take awhile. One point to keep in mind is that each time you change location, there's a cost involved in both time and money. If you're working with a "tight budget", you'll need to consider that. You can easily visit Pisa as a day trip from Florence, so it's not necessary to stay there. The one "complication" in your Itinerary is Madrid, since it's somewhat "distant" from the other places you'll be visiting. It would be better to take a budget flight from Nice to Madrid rather than travel by train. Working out an Itinerary for the other places should be relatively easy. Using open-jaw flights (inbound London, outbound Rome) would be the most efficient method. Check your local Library or larger book stores to have a look at Rick's country of city-specific Guidebooks. Good luck with your planning!