Eurail pass hidden fees?

Question

I'm looking to do some traveling in Europe this fall. Spain, France, Germany, Italy, and the countries in between. over about 3 months.

right now i plan to bus between cities, i dont plan on staying anywhere for too long and am on a tight a budget i can possible be. I've been told to get one of the passes on the Eurail, or a something. I've heard from some places its a pass that lets you on and off at will, but other places said that the pass only gives you a discount, a second fee is needed before you board the train.

can someone explain to me how the Eurail passes work? is there another fee other than the actual pass?

conley39 · Accepted Answer

This site explains train travel in much more detail that there is room for in an answer here. http://www.seat61.com/Railpass-and-Eurai… . It will tell you how to determine whether a pass is worth the money for your trip.Sometimes a Eurail pass is cheaper than individual tickets and sometimes not. Sometimes, it is cheaper to use a Eurail pass for part of a trip and individual tickets for another part. You already know that with a pass, you still need to make reservations and pay an additional fee on many high speed, international and night trains. Here in Italy, the mandatory reservation for a high speed train would cost 10 euro. Slower regional trains do not require a reservation. The site also has links to the various national train sites where you can price individual tickets - it can be cheaper to buy individual tickets, especially in places like Spain and Italy. Read the section called "Common railpass mistakes: Italy..." and the section called "Common railpass mistakes: Spain..." on the seat61 site, for example. You're more likely to save money with a pass if you want to travel spontaneously and can't buy individual tickets in advance to take advantage of discounts. Do read the sections on Quotas as well. On popular routes like between Paris and Amsterdam, or between Paris and Italy or Spain, there can be a limit to the number of railpasses that can be used on a given train. If you don't make the reservation early enough, you can end up having to pay full fare even when you have a pass or you will have to find alternative routes which may require multiple train changes.

There is information on reservations here: http://www.eurail.com/planning/train-seat-reservations/reservation-fees

mildred f · Answer

Germany has extensive information about this.  Seat61 something.  You generally need both the ticket and a reservation for your seat.  So that's two fees.  You cannot get on a train without a seat assignment.  This is a very big topic so I will let you look up what you have to do.  European countries use a train rather than a bus between cities.

Eurail pass hidden fees?

2 Answers