Europe Transportation
Hey guys! I will be in Europe for 2 months this summer for the first time. I did my calculations and I'll be visiting around 10-15 cities during that period. I'm thinking on buying the Eurail Global pass and have the option to either buy an every day 2 month pass (more expensive) or a 15 day between a 2 month period pass. I will stay most of the time exploring the cities and might take a side trip on few of them for example Toledo, Pisa, and Versailles. I'm just a bit concerned if I'm going to be doing a lot train travel within the cities or if I'm going to rely on the local transportation. I also wanted to know if I were to take a night train (Eurail) would that count as 2 days? Thanks in advance!1
Whether or not it is 'worth' buying a pass depends on where exactly you are going.In any case,on your specific questions...I doubt you will use the train much within cities.Most people get around on foot,by bus or metro.
On the night trains..if it leaves in the evening and arrives the next morning,only the date of arrival is counted as a 'travel day'.
You will however need to pay supplements on many of these night trains.....
2
Adding to lucapal's post: If you do want to visit a city nearby the city you're staying it might be necessary to take a train as inter-city connections are often not covered by metro and bus. However, for those short trips it might be cheaper to buy a separate train ticket and don't spend days of your rail pass. Where you of course should take into account the price difference between the passes and the amount of separate train tickets you might buy to see what is the cheaper option in the end.3
Do you really think that anybody can give you a good answer, if you don't even tell us to wich places you want to travel? Low cost planes are often cheaper than trains, for some legs ferries are more appropriate (and nicer) than trains, for others, discounted point to point train tickets bought in advance in the web are cheaper than everything else, between Italy and Slovenia or Croatia, resp. between Greece and it's neighbouring countries, there are just no trains......4
Read this for everything you ever wanted to know about railpasses. They are not the wonderful bargain and fantastic idea that they were back when the world was young, around 30 years ago. The chances are that you will save money by not buying a railpass. Very often the reservation fee alone is more than it would cost you to buy a point-to-point ticket (in advance) for the same journey, and some high-speed Intercity trains have a quota for pass-holders.If you know exactly where you want to go and when, it will be much cheaper to buy tickets in advance, but the cheapest tickets are not refundable and they are restricted to a specific train. And buy the tickets from each country's own railway website rather than a ticket agency such as RailEurope, which charges huge fees.
