I'll be traveling around on a Eurail Global Pass June-July. I'm experienced at doing this. I'm also experienced at making plans online, usually by using bahn.de, to find choices. So I know what it means when a certain Swiss train shows up on bahn.de as "please reserve" as opposed to "resv required" or words to that effect. My question now is: Does anyone have any personal experience with Swiss trains, esp. IC trains, not regional, mid-week, mid-day, that say "please reserve"? I.e., is it likely they'd sell out, or am I probably ok to just plan to show up, hop on and go, esp since I'll be using a 1st class pass? Thx. Tom
Posted by
Seattle, WA
16338 posts
Reservations are possible but not required. We have traveled all over Switzerland and have never made reservations for travel within The country. Only once did we encounter a train that was so crowded we could not find seats, and that was heading into Zurich own the day of the Street Parade, which draws about a million people. Even on that day, there were empty seats in First Class ( we saw them but could not sit there as we had second class passes).
Posted by
Elk Grove, CA, USA
6898 posts
We've never been on a full train in Switzerland. We've had 1/2-fare cards and buy tickets as we travel. We did find one fairly full train going to Zurich and subsequently the airport but there was still a few empty seats.
Posted by
OP
Easley, SC, USA
306 posts
thx. pretty much what I thought but it reassures me to hear from others with real experience.