Locko123
Traveller
0 comments
Posted 13 years ago
Hey, i am new to the whole interrail thing and need a bit (actually quite a lot) of help.
Firstly, we have allocated ourselves 16 days for this journey. 1 of these days will be used to travel from our hometown of leicester (england) to london, and then london to paris. my first question is, would you suggest getting a ferry from dover to calais and then a train from calais to france (obviously the french train will be included within our interrail pass) or would getting the eurostar be worth spending the extra money?
Secondly, once in mainland europe. do you think that this trip could be done on a 15 day rail pass? we wanted to include prague but thought that would be a little too much?
so, trip would be
Paris, were not too bothered about staying overnight as we have all stayed in paris before, so a look around the main sites and then a night train out would be excellent.
Bruge
Amsterdam, it goes without saying, a night or two here would be nice.
Berlin
Vienna
Venice
do you have any tips for us?
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
Hi!
First, the trip certainly can be done within 15 days, although you might have to rush a little. But definitely possible.
To go to Paris, the ferry certainly is the cheaper option. But have a look at the Eurostar website as they often have promotional tickets which are quite cheap. Maybe there are even offers for the whole trip Leicester - Paris? Dont really know about that... Anyway, if you decide on going by ferry, dont underestimate the distance: Leicester - St Pancras 1h15, St Pancras - Dover via HS1 1h15, transfer to ferry, checkin, ferry takes about 1h30, transfer to station (and 1 hour time difference!), then by regular trains ~4h Calais - Paris. Not much time left for a walk around Paris if you want to leave in the evening.
That brings us to the next problem; baggage lockers are very expensive at Paris stations in my experience...dont know if you would like to lug around your stuff in Paris. Plus, there is no night train to Brugge.
You could use the night train to Venezia instead :arr: [u]https://rail.cc/en/paris-milan-venice-train/f3674[/u]
Venezia - Wien is also best done by night train :arr: [u]https://rail.cc/en/venice-vienna-night-train/f3672[/u]
Wien - Berlin: If you are willing to get up early and take the first train at 0550 you can make a stopover at Praha for several hours before leaving to Berlin with the last train in the evening. We did this in 2008 and had enough time to see all the main sights, drink beer, etc... :)
Berlin - Amsterdam: [u]https://rail.cc/en/berlin-amsterdam-train/f2407[/u]
Amsterdam - Brugge: Dont use the Thalys trains as described in the link :arr: [u]https://rail.cc/en/amsterdam-brussels-train-thalys/f3991[/u] Instead go to Bruxelles and the continue to Brugge. Or, a little faster leave at Antwerpen already and head for Gent, then Brugge.
From Brugge, you can return to Calais ferryport via Kortijk and Lille. Or use the Eurostar from Bruxelles.
Hope this helps for the start, if you need more details just let me know.
Flo 8)