anonymous
Traveller
2469 comments
Posted 9 years ago
Hi my wife and I will be coming to Europe in late September or early October 2016 :D and staying for about a month. places that we would like to visit would be but not limited to Istanbul, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Munich and Scotland. Do you think this is to ambitious for a month trip or do you think its do able? Having never been to or traveled in Europe with so many countries and borders is travel there slow? Do the the different borders cause a lot of delays? I'm looking for info and advice from the extensive travelers of Europe. Does it make sense to by rail tickets to and from the main hubs we want to stay in and then rent a car for day trips into neighboring cities and countries, or can you do it all on rail passes? Any and all help given would be appreciated. You can also send me a friend request if you like so we can talk outside the forum . We would also enjoy meeting people that we get help from during our stay there. also we are an older couple who have traveled in Canada(my home) the USA(her home) and Mexico and we are about to be empty nesters and wanna see more of this great world we live in. Thanks Monti
nltrainer
Traveller
1405 comments
start with the very basics: where are you from. You state to visit EUR-so I guess you from overseas-in that case IR is simply not available to you, have to use EUrail, which is not valid (and much more expensive) in the starting countries of this trip anyway. You may have visa-issues too.
Borders do not make ANY dent in this trip-we have INTernational trains since well over 1 century-in fact we invented them- and on most customs/immigration comes on the trains. And ever heard of Schengen? From RO-HU border till going to UK no more regular checks.
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
Hi Monti!
The basic things already have been mentioned:
- You could think about a Eurail pass that would cover many, but not all European countries; this could make sense for travel in Central and Western Europe but since it is only available in 1st class you could be cheaper off by travelling with regular tickets for 2nd class when bought in advance - an exact calculation is only possible when you have a more or less exact route.
- Crossing borders is not a big issue, especially in the Schengen area where there are no more controls at the borders. There are frequent international connections on the main routes throughout Europe, only in some parts of Eastern Europe international trains are less frequent with sometimes only one daily departure.
Whether you will have to rent a car depends on which sights/places you want to visit; if there are no rail connections you often find alternative options by bus as well.
Just write here if you have further questions during the planning stage of your trip! :)
Flo 8)