dannywilki
Traveller
25 comments
Posted 9 years ago
I'm 18 years old, and next summer will have a couple months of nothing to do!Ive always wanted to travel and realized interrailing sounds perfect, as i want to do lots of countries. I am a total beginner so wondering for some help. I have only been looking ito it for a few days, and ive not totally planned it, but i would love to do paris-brussels-amsterdam-berlin-prague-munich-zurich-venice-vienna-budapest-zagreb. Is this possible in a month? Would i be able to take night trains each time i travel? as ill be going from country to country pretty much every time, i might be totally wrong and theres no chance, so im just here for advice :) thanks very much!
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
Hi!
Yeah, this is absolutely no problem! I'd recommend to stay 2-3 days in each city (if you are interested in smaller cities and villages along the way it is usually sufficient to stay there just one day to get an impression), so 10 countries is no problem at all.
Also your route is pretty straightforward and you will be able to travel without extra reservations without much hassle on most of the legs of your trip.
For basic information about recomended routes, trains with/without compulsory reservation, timetables, night trains: [u]https://rail.cc/en/first-time-interrail[/u]
To support the free information and the forum on railcc, please be fair and buy your official Interrail pass via our railcc partner link: [ux]https://rail.shop/interrail[/ux]
Thank you! :)
Flo 8)
dannywilki
Traveller
25 comments
Thanks for the help! I was hoping that in the order i named the cities i would be able to take night trains for eahc, that way i get more of my day and i can sleep on the train. However i have been looking and it seems a lot are not night trains! Any advice on this? :)
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
Well, you could rearrange your schedule accordingly, for example like this:
Amsterdam - night train to Munich - night train to Venice - night train to Vienna - night train to Berlin - night train to Zürich - night train to Prague - night train to Budapest
dannywilki
Traveller
25 comments
Do you think it would be better for me to do this with the night trains? or do you recommend another way? Also i recently decided to add poznan in there. Is this a nice place and easy to visit? I would also like to fit in bosnia, which i guess i could makwe the last place i go, after croatia (zagreb).
ardeeay
Traveller
99 comments
Hi
I am a confirmed night-train user. I agree that travelling by night and walking around cities by day is far better than the other way around. Using a Eurail Pass and Balkan Flexi-pass two (northern) summers ago I visited 28 European capital cities (some twice) in 40 days, and last summer with Eurail Pass only visited 12 countries (about 20 cities) in one month.
As a bit of a challenge I tried not to use hotels unless there was absolutely NO alternative, like in Dublin and Sarajevo - the end of the line in each case. Night ferries were good too. As a concession to advancing years and a bit of a desire for comfort, I always tried to get a sleeping compartment with en suite facilities. The costs were competitive with the hotels and you get to meet a lot of great people in the trains!
Because of the early sunrise and long evenings in your summer (particularly in Scandinavia) there is quite a bit of scenery to see from the train even though you may wish to sleep for maybe 6 hours a night! But between 8 and 12 hours per day will be available to walk and explore in the destination cities. I reached North Cape (using a bus for the final bit from Rovaniemi to North Cape) for midnight on the summer solstice. Thirty nine hours of daylight I think.
None of my rail passes covered Poland so I did not get to visit Warsaw or Krakow (or Poznan). I think it may be different with an InterRail Pass.
The night ferry Harwich to Hoek van Holland is really good and connects well with trains to Amsterdam (and from Liverpool Street, London). I think they offer a good deal for passholders travelling from a number of other cities in the UK.
Bosnia, Croatia and Slovenia are great (capital cities anyway) as are Bulgaria (Sophia and Plovdiv - a real surprise for me.)
In summer 2014 I visited a number of cities more than once by using the night trains to shuttle between (eg) Prague and Amsterdam (no hotels, but 3 days in each of the cities). Some of the CNL night trains I used are no longer running so an adjusted itinerary would be needed!
Your plans look quite do-able to me and very appealing!
You may get some further info from my previous posts on some of the details.
Good travels
Richard
nltrainer
Traveller
1405 comments
[quote]
1.Do you think it would be better for me to do this with the night trains?
2.or do you recommend another way?
3.Also i recently decided to add Poznan in there. Is this a nice place and easy to visit?
4. I would also like to fit in Bosna i Hercegovina, which i guess i could make the last place i go, after Hrvatska (Zagreb).[/quote]
@1.@2. you decide=the alt. is obviously staying in cheapo hoStels-and as most nighttrains require you to pay extra, this may sometimes nearly work out the same-except that hoStels have real bunkbeds, showers, often free T/Cf , brekkie or whatever included.
#3. Its daft easy to visit, but IMHO (and Ive been there dozens of times in about any main city) PN is not a very attractive city-but hardly any PL city is that. IF you want only trains, swap for Warszawa or Krakow (=PL main attraction), maybe think of prebooking Polskibus bus Nightbus from Berlin to either Waw or Krakow or if you want Pzn, Pozn->Prahy, as trains are woofully bad on that route.
@4- ask another.
dannywilki
Traveller
25 comments
Do you think i could do more countries than ive said then? i would love to just visit as many as possible, but it is my first time. As you can see from above i was recommended a route by night trains but there are still some where there is no night train, for example to paris, then to brussels, then to amsterdam. Then its night trains, until i go from budapest to zagreb ans zagreb to sarajevo. Are the trains in the daytime and very long? Also could you tell me if i have to pay extra for a night train or can i just get on with my interrail? Thanks.
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
Did you have a look at the link I posted above? [u]https://rail.cc/en/first-time-interrail[/u]
There you will find pricing information for all night trains as well as links about how to look for train schedules as well as examples for travel between several important locations, for example Bruxelles - Amsterdam: [u]https://rail.cc/en/interrail/brussels-to-amsterdam[/u]
dannywilki
Traveller
25 comments
Yes i have had a look and sorry for being such a 'noob' to this i just cant seem to grasp which night traons are how much. Could you give me how much extra it would be for amsterdam to berlin night train then i may be able to figure it out? Thanks. I would really love to visit sweden norway and finland, but im thinking they are too far and i owuldnt have time? what do you think? thanks so much!!
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
There is no Amsterdam - Berlin night train; you could only take the night train from Oberhausen (which is the first stop in Germany if you travel with ICE trains from Amsterdam towards Cologne) in direction of Prague and get off very early in the morning in Berlin: [u]https://rail.cc/en/interrail-night-train/cologne-prague-cnl40447/420[/u]
But this does not make much sense in my opinion...
Have a look at the link above where you will find night train timings and prices. Similar info can be found for all night trains here, just click on a country and a list of all night trains running through that country will appear - click on a specific night train to see all details: [u]https://rail.cc/en/interrail-night-train[/u]
dannywilki
Traveller
25 comments
sorry i meant munich, is there an amsterdam-munich night train?
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
Have a look at the link... ;)
dannywilki
Traveller
25 comments
There is :P
So it says ''sleeprette - 17,50/19,50 (Res. EUR 10/12 when travelling with regular tickets)
Does this mean aswell as my interrail pass, ill be paying 17,50 for the night train?
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
Yeah - but I just updated timings and fares for 2015 and the fare is now 18/20 depending on the season. Sadly the fares on CNL trains have gotten more and more expensive during the last years... :|
dannywilki
Traveller
25 comments
okay thanks, what does the 10/12 euros mean then? are all night train fares about this much or does it range a lot? :)
also, i owuldnt really be losing money would i as this would otherwsie be spent on a hostel?
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
The other reservation fare (10€) applies for regular tickets, for instance a standard Amsterdam - Munich single or return ticket (which is 151€ for a single) or advance fare offers such as Europa Spezial which is available from 39€.
So travelling with InterRail and paying the more expensive reservation fare still is quite a good offer (although it got more expensive compared to past years): If you travel with a one month pass (which currently is 442€) one every other day this would equal in costs of ~30€ for each travel day - plus reservation this is still cheaper than the cheapest advance fare ticket.
Also, you would have to spend the money for accomodation anyway unless you stay at a friends place or do couchsurfing.
dannywilki
Traveller
25 comments
Thanks :) what are travel days? with a month pass does this apply to me?
Is 1200 euros enough (not incuding ticket)? :)
Also are the times for around June available for the trains? Or would i have to plan it later on?
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
With the one month pass you dont have to worry about travel days, you can travel for one month continuously (eg from 3 June until 2 July).
These are only important if you have a flexi InterRail pass, which are available a 5in10 or 10in22 variants: [u]https://rail.cc/en/interrail-global-pass[/u]
Anyway, when calculating and comparing travel costs I also use the term travel day for continuous tickets such as the one month pass: If you are going to use the one month pass on, say, 18 days for rail travel, then you can calculate the average cost of a travel day which would be in that case 442€/18 = 24,50€
This is useful for comparisons to normal tickets as well as to other InterRail passes.
In mid June timings will be amended throughout Europe but you can plan with current timings as normally there are no big changes - the more important timetable change was on last Sunday.
1200€ sounds very reasonable for a month long trip. This would average about 40€ per day which is doable also in Western Europe.