Purchase train tickets

If you are starting in Germany, I'd buy the tickets from the Bahn (German Rail). You might also want to check prices on Swiss Rail.

Do not use one of the 3rd party sellers like RailEurope or Trainline. They'll probably charge more for the ticket and add a service fee or shipping to boot.

Download the DB Navigator app. It’s for German trains, but it shows lots of routes all over Europe. It will tell you the options. You can purchase your tickets and reserve seats in the app. Tickets for long distance trains are generally cheaper farther in advance.

How much time between end of cruise to start of RS tour in Luzern? If you have some time, maybe stop in Munich for a day or 2. Regional train from Regensburg to Munich goes every hour and you can use a Bayern Ticket For 42 EUR for first person and 10 EUR for each additional person. Also gives free public transport in Munich for the rest of the day. You can buy that ticket with the app or ticket machine. There is a service charge if you buy from a human at the ticket window.

Munich to Luzern is an EC train to Zurich, then a local train to Luzern.

seat61.com is a great source of info for all things trains. You can type in your starting and ending point and it will tell you how to book (always directly with the train site, NOT a 3rd party site). You can also see photos of the different classes, cars, etc. You can also email the man who owns the site and he is very helpful. Regensburg and Lucerne are 2 of my favorite towns -- enJOY your trip.

Just to give a differing viewpoint than one of the posts above. I often use Trainline and have found it very convenient and user friendly. Happy travels.

I have also used Trainline with a small booking fee because it is a very easy site to use and will remind me of trips I may be holding. Seat61 is THE man for trains without a doubt! Not your situation, however with a 1st class Eurailpass the only way to book seat reservations for where I was headed, without going to an office, was Rail Europe. An SNCF office
concurred I needed an agent and could not do it on the machines at the station. Believe me, I looked into all possibilities. However if anyone knows something I don't feel free to correct me. I booked ÖBB directly with a railpass, though. All of this was done in the last week.

I just tickled Trainline for the cost for two to go from the airport in Munich to Salzburg. They quoted $47.96 plus a $2.40 booking fee for $50.36. You can do that trip with a 2 person Bayern-Ticket for €42. That would be $45.41 today and would cost $45.86 with a 1% charge for a credit union ATM withdrawal, still $4.50 less.

My other problem with Trainline is that they offer the chance to buy a cancellable ticket for another $8.24, but they don't tell you that if you wait until the day of travel, you can **not buy* the ticket and it doesn't cost you anything.

Americans don't seem to understand that buying train tickets in Europe is not like buying airline tickets here. For most cases, there is no necessity nor advantage to buying in advance. Buy your ticket just before you travel. It's more like taking the bus downtown.

We do find it better to buy train tickets way in advance on the BAHN site for Germany or the Italo site for Italy if we want 1st class as they are MUCH cheaper in advance. We can often get 1st class for only slightly higher than 2nd class by booking early. It is worth it to us to have nicer seats with our luggage close by on many trips for only 1-6Euros more by booking 4-6mo out.

Like most things in life, there is no one simple answer.

• Generally, not always, individual tickets seem to work better for the average tourist than passes. The only way to know is to prcie it both ways for your holdiay plans.
  
• Skip the 3rd party sellers. Maybe they arent all bad, but I also dont think they are necessary. Check the price with the national company of the country where the train begins and where it ends. There can be a substantial price difference. Is there risk of holding a Hungarian ticket to board a train in Austira? In the internet age, I dont think so.
  
• Do use the train company app to download and hold your ticket. I would print a copy too if you can.
  
• On some ocassions there are situatons where the train company still wants you to have a paper copy. Print it if you can or there will be ticket machines at the train station that will print one for you. I've never run into this, but Ive heard about it is all.

Americans don't seem to understand that buying train tickets in Europe
is not like buying airline tickets here. For most cases, there is no
necessity nor advantage to buying in advance. Buy your ticket just
before you travel. It's more like taking the bus downtown.

• A European didnt invest $12000 to get to Europe and back. Dont gamble on things you dont have to gamble on.
• I went thrugh about an hour long process some weeks back checking ticket costs from Vienna to Budapest. I checked from Obb and from MAV. I checked tomorrow, 2 weeks out 4 weeks out 6 weeks out....... Prices changed and sometimes changed a lot. The European going to Vienna tomorrow may not care about spending 50 euro on a ticket that three weeks earlier cost 13 euro, but .......

The European going to Vienna tomorrow may not care about spending 50
euro on a ticket that three weeks earlier cost 13 euro, but ....

Why does an American that is able to afford 12000$ air tickets actually care that much?

OK, I should have been more specific. In most cases, you should just buy your tickets at the station, from an automat, on the day of, or the day before, travel.

You can save money by buying discounted tickets in advance for travel on long distance trains (EC, IC, ICE). If you are going a long distance, those trains can get you there quicker. But there are a lot of caveats associated with these discounted tickets. They are train specific, limited to travel on specified (date and time) trains. The least expensive Super Sparpreis tickets are completely non-refundable. Even Sparpreis tickets are non-transferrable; you can only cancel them and buy a new ticket at whatever would be the price then.

Super Sparpreis and Sparpreis tickets start at much lower prices, but are "tiered". The price goes up a the lower priced tickets sell out. The price never goes down.

To purchase these discounted tickets, you must be confident that you will be in that German town on that day and can make that specific train. Sparpreis tickets should never be used for travel right after arrival on a flight from the US. If your flight is late, you lose the cost of the ticket and have to purchase a replacement at full cost.

In a period of ten years, since these ticket were first introduced in ~2008, then called "seasonal" Spezial (e.g., Winter Special), I have only purchase 4 of them out of at least 59 rail tickets (i.e., 6.8%, one in 15) tickets I have purchased.

By far, the ticket I have purchased most often is a "Länder Ticket", a daylong ticket for one (or a combingation of) states, such as the Bayern (Bavarian) ticket. These tickets are best purchase the day of travel, there is no price benefit for purchasing them sooner, or as soon before as you can commit, because one purchased, the cannot be refunded. It would be silly to purchase them in advance, because once you by them you are locked in to that date.