fonnee
Traveller
8 comments
Posted 12 years ago
Hi, I can not decide what to do :) and I hope you can help me. This summer we would like to travel for 1.5 or 2 weeks by train with our daughter (15 yrs)
After much confusion and many options ( like venice, rome, pisa, nice, barcelona paris) we decided that that is probably to much for this period. So after much thinking the next is plan is stil up
from the netherlands to spain (barcelone area) we are planning to stay at 2 different places in spain (barcelona and a smal village on the coast ) and in 2 or 3 places in france ( maybe Montpellier or Nice and on the way back in paris)
What would you recommend costwise ? and why ? And do you have any suggestions of places we should visit ?
Flo
Traveller
10724 comments
Hi,
finally some thoughts on this from my side. ;)
I think the only sensible option if you go with InterRail would be the 5in10 pass, the 10in22 probably would be overkill seeing that you want to travel for 2 weeks max.
This would mean:
2? 5in10 IR passes adult: 2x267€, one travel day 53,4€
1 5in10 IR passes youth: 175€, one travel day 35€
It is difficult to compare that to regular prices if you do not know your exact route yet. Anyway, a possible route could be:
1) Apeldoorn - Paris
2) Paris and night train to Latour de Carol or Perpignan, travel with Petit Train Jaune and arrive in Barcelona in the evening
3) Barcelona
4) Barcelona
5) Barcelona - Avignon
6) Avignon
7) Avignon - Nice
8) Nice
9) Nice and night train to Paris
10) Paris to Apeldoorn, maybe short stop along the route in Brugge, Antwerpen,...?
This would get the maximum out of the 5 travel days, mainly using the 1900 rule for night trains. Both night trains are Intercités de Nuit (ex Lunéa) services which offer either 2nd class reclining seats or 2nd class 6bed couchettes, both more or less comfortable, although not as much as a proper bed. ;)
On this trip you would need definitely reservations for the night trains (6€ reclining seats, 17,50€ 6bed couchette), if you want to travel with TGV you could do so between Lille and Paris for 6€.
Another interesting alternative would be to use a direct Bruxelles - Perpignan TGV but it could be difficult to get InterRail reservations for that one.
Have a look here to compare InterRail prices to regular tickets :arr: [ux]https://rail.shop/omio[/ux]
Flo 8)
nltrainer
Traveller
1405 comments
er is de treinreiswinkel en een dito forum in NL - daar zijn mensen die wat meer tijd+zin hebben dat soort dingen uit te zoeken.
You are not quite clear how big the group is- 2 adults+ 1 15 yr old?
In FR you can also-IF you can get organised, cope with th French laguage, book online and take profit the tarif famille for longer trips-this often beats IR for a single long trip in 1 day.. f.e. the direct TGV from BRUssel to Montpellier-via voyages-sncf.
IF IR is a better choice costwise or not will mainly depend if you also will want to make many excursions by train during your stay. Plus that both in FR and in ES there are extra fees for the obligatory REServations-and ''quota==that means only a limited nr is sold to those nasty cheap ISR-users.
IF in ES you only go to Barca and around and use the local trains: do not bother with IR-just pay when there-cheap enough. Plus tha buses are often much easier to find, use and bring you to many more seaside places.
fonnee
Traveller
8 comments
Hi Flo and nltrainer,
Thanks for your answers and thoughts ! :)
We are travelling with 2 adults and 1 15 year old.
We have again discussed what we would like and what our expectations would be.
This is what is important for us: we would like to travel with normal trains (so no hi speed) as much as possbile, we would like to travel day time as much as possible and we would like to be able to hop on and of a train if we feel like it and even spend the night in a town if we feel like it. So we would like as much freedom as possible :D
So Maybe a 10in22 days would be wise, but more expensive :( and we have a budget to consider. Maybe a one country pass for france for 8 days is a good alternative since we will only travel small distances in spain. Then I only have to find a good deal for belgium.
fonnee