Single Country of Select 2,3,4 Countries Pass

Your itinerary is running in circles. It would be very difficult to navigate the above itinerary--even for an experienced European traveler.
Have you considered going on an organized tour if you want to see so many places?
You really need to choose between Italy and Switzerland or France and Belgium.

I hope that the window washers for the trains have done a good job. The inside of those windows is all you will see.

Hi David,

We can remove the Belgium part if it is too much. Do you think it will be ok without it? We added that in because we found out that Brussels is only one and a half hour ride from Paris. Strasbourg and Colmar also added because we thought the places were on the way between Paris and Zurich.

Hi Nigel,

Our train rides were really that long?

Seriously, yours is the most rushed itinerary I have ever seen. You are hitting some major site packed cities for esentially one night? Are you flying into Rome and out of Paris? I looks to me that you are only using Rome and Paris as entry and departure airports. Have you been to these two cities before?

I would begin to rework this itinerary with more days in key destinations, elimate Belgium, pick only 2 destinations in Switzerland after doing some serious guidebook reading and deciding what you actually want to SEE in some of these wonderful places. Otherwise, what Nigel says...I hope your train windows are clean, you have your running shoes on and your cameras set to high speed. I think you can rework your itinerary but you need to evaluate why you are wanting to go to Europe and what you want to experience.

EDIT: once you fine tune your itinerary people can better help you figure out if point to point tickets or different types of rail passes will be most useful for your destinations.

Hi Mona,

As per your advise, we will remove Belgium from our plan.
We have never been to any of the European countries.

For Rome, we will only be visiting the must see sites from Rick Steve's Pocket Rome.
It is two full days and a half day stay in Rome for us. I hope it will be enough.
Should we reduce Florence in Italy and more day in Rome?

If we have two choose two destinations in Switzerland, we will choose Zermatt and one other most likely Lucerne.
Do you think the other two might be a better choice?

And back to my main question, which pass would be better?

Thanks

I think you can further adjust your itinerary, like spending an afternoon, one night and morning in Florence just doesn't make sense only to take the train to Pisa to snap a picture of the Tower and then travel in the same day to Venice where you are spending an nice amount of time.

Not knowing why you are picking these destinations and what your interests are I'd still streamline to something like:

Rome (3 nights)
Florence (2 nights)
Venice (3 nights)

Bellagio (2 nights)
Zermatt (2 nights)
Lucerne (2 nights)

Paris (4 nights with one day trip?)

This still has you taking some long train rides but you might have a chance to experience some of the locations where you'll be.

Once YOU decide on your itinerary you will be better able to do the math and compare passes and tickets. You are within the window of buying Saver point to point tickets so some of the lowest fares may already be gone. Typically Italian train tickets are the least expensive and using a Eurailpass isn't cost effective in Italy. A 15 plus two extra bonus day continuous Select Saver Eurailpass Global (2 people traveling together) for 5 countries is currently $559 pp. An 11 day in 2 months 3 country Select Saver (2 people traveling together) pass $520 pp. You will need to do the math the second option averages about $47 per day.

Thank you Mona for your advice.

We will try to adjust the plan accordingly. We will reduce the train rides as much as possible in a day.

Our interest is mainly to visit Europe which we have never been before and at the same time, visit the places we have heard of before. We are a normal tourist couple who doesn't know much. :)

We are still doing researches on where to go and what to do which will fit us.

Before committing, research the cost of hotels in Switzerland to be sure you're OK with what you will have to pay. Switzerland is very expensive.

Chan have you flown long distances before? Where are you flying from/to? More importantly, how long is the flight?

I am worried about your jetlag on arrival, and the first day or two catching you by surprise when you are extremely tired in the middle of the day.

People from different countries tend to travel a bit differently depending on their culture. Broadly speaking - yes quite broadly - Australians tend to have a different travel pattern than many Americans; Chinese tend to travel a bit differently than many Germans or Swedes. Understanding your expectations helps us meet them.

Also, understanding your age group and any disabilities or other conditions can help tailor the trip.

Hi Nigel,

We are mid 30 couple.
Our flight time is around 15 hours.

We live in Singapore so it is 7 hours earlier than Rome.

We have never fly this long before. The longest has been 3 to 4 hours.

Very kindly Chan, but this itinerary is insane. You won't be doing much more than packing up, getting to train stations, sitting on trains, finding your hotels, dropping/unpacking the luggage, and then starting all over again. You need many more days with no moves at all; every move kills time that could be spent sightseeing. Keep in mind that it also takes some time to get acclimated to the layouts of every new city.

Personally, I think 4 nights/ 3 full days is the minimum for Rome, 3 nights for Florence, and 3 for Venice. Paris deserves all of days 15/16/17 plus morning of Day 18 - eliminating the Mt Saint-Michel day trip - and Bruges deserves an overnight. Pisa is in the completely opposite direction if going to Venice from Florence, although it could be a stop between Rome and Florence.

A trip from Venice to Bellagio will eat up an entire day as it's nearly 5 hours to, say, Varenna-Esino by train just to catch a ferry to Bellagio. And why go to Lucerne with no time allotted to do anything but sleep there?

So along with removing Belgium, I'd trim even more. Really, I think you'll be too exhausted halfway though this marathon to enjoy your holiday! Tight itineraries are always a risk as all it take is one misstep - a missed train, a transport strike, a day of traveler's tummy - to throw them completely off. Also, the one day you've allowed for any city could end up being the day that some of the attractions you wanted to see could be closed, or could be less enjoyable if it happens to pour rain.

I know, it's tempting to want to see it ALL but trying to do that too often results in seeing very little at all; just madly running from one thing to another with an eye on the clock versus the treasures to discovered and explored. Consider doing another trip in the future to cover some of these destinations at a less hectic pace?

Hi,

I would drop Switzerland or Belgium from the itinerary if you do not have a month, ie ca 30 days. You have barely three weeks. I've done 3 countries in three weeks but it rather rushed and it was not my first trip either. Drop Brussels and take the TGV train Strasbourg to Paris. Different nationalities of tourists generally go to different sites and do travel differently.

Wow, so glad you posted, so you can hear about some options to make your trip much more enjoyable.

Too, too many locations with such short stops! Take all of your proposed locations and start crossing off names until you have 6 left. Or, pick the two countries you really want to see. Then, go to the website rome2rio.com and enter each location to see how many hours by train between locations.

Count on jetlag making you very tired the day of arrival & part of the next day. For your itinerary listed, Rome could just be a blur in your memory.

To really enjoy your trip, I highly recommend having 3 nights at each location. That equates to one day to arrive at the next location, check into the hotel & get acclimated to the new city locations & local transportation. Then you have two days to enjoy the highlights on your list for that city.

Hi Kathy,

Thanks for the advice.
We will consider removing some parts of the trip as you recommended.

Hi Fred,

Thanks for the advice.
We will consider removing some parts of the trip but it might not be the whole of Switzerland as we want to go there.
Maybe we will reduce the days there.

Hi Jean,

Thanks for the advice.
We will start crossing off names.
And thanks for the info on rome2rio.com

If you decide to include Switzerland for the Alps, pick one destination and stay there at least three nights. You can easily lose an entire day to bad weather, and staying for two full days gives you a bit of a hedge. There's nothing worse than paying all that cash to stay in Switzerland, and then seeing nothing but rain and clouds.