Hi All,
If I am buying a eurail global pass, every trip that I can found at the rail planner apps is means that I can take the train? For example, I am planning a trip to Amsterdam, can I take Amsterdam Centraal to Zaandijik Zaanse Schans without paying extra cost to visit? Or, London St Pancras to Canterbury West also include in the eurail global pass?
There is an option "only in pass network" that you can switch on. Then you only see routes included in the pass.
However, there are several railway companies that don't send their timetables to Interrail/Eurail so there are more trains included than those you can see.
The advice from the experienced travellers is not to use the Railplanner for planning. Read more below.
Here is some useful information from the experienced travellers in the Community regarding both planning, reservations and activation of pass and travel days.
Planning
The rail planner is normally not up to date, as it only is updated once a month, so to be sure of the time table you better check the timetable and availability on the websites of the national railways. The bigger national railways, like DB (Germany) SBB (Switzerland) and ÖBB (Austria) cover several countries.
Reservations
The advice from the experienced travellers in the community is to use other ways to make reservations than the Interrail/Eurail website. You can look at the guide in the link:
https://community.eurail.com/train-connections-reservations-47/how-to-get-reservations-105
If you, after having looked at the guide, have questions about how to make specific reservation, please give your travel details (departure date, time and route) preferably in a new topic, and you will get advice.
Please note that Interrail/Eurail charges an extra fee of 2 EUR per person and train in addition to the fee for the seat reservation.
Activation of pass
During the activation process you choose the start day of the validity of the pass. Once the validity has started it can't be changed even if you haven't travelled. The advice is therefore to wait with activating the pass and starting the validity until the first day of your travel as you only can deactivate the pass no later than 23.59 CET on the day before the validity starts. If your travel plans change in the last moment you can't deactivate the pass and change the validity.
It can be wise to make a test and activate the pass with a start date well in the future and then deactivate the pass immediately, just to see that everything works.
Activation of travel day
The advice from the experienced travellers in the community is also never to activate a travel day, that is connect a journey to your pass and create the ticket (QR code), until just before boarding the train, otherwise you might loose a travel day if your travel plans change in a late stage You can't delete a travel day in the past. A travel day can only be deleted until 23.59 CET the day before the travel day.
Here you can check which railway companies that are included in the Interrail/Eurail offer.
https://www.interrail.eu/en/plan-your-trip/tips-and-tricks/trains-europe/railway-companies
I assume you are aware that some trains need a mandatory reservation at extra cost before travelling? This is especially so for the Eurostar between UK and continent, Thalys trains and cross border TGVs (SNCF).
I assume you are aware that some trains need a mandatory reservation at extra cost before travelling? This is especially so for the Eurostar between UK and continent, Thalys trains and cross border TGVs (SNCF).
All TGVs need resevations. At least the Eurostar and Thalys have a limited number of pass holder seats available.
What about the cross border TGVs
Yes and no-seems to depend on the actual route-some how I recall the line to LUXembourg does not-or rather in the same way as inland TGV, but the normal passholder shuns that line.
I also recall, as one gets a splendid overview on what trains are available for what price by using the SNCF INland (and in LUX) Big machines, that I got the impression that on some busy days (mostly fri and sun) all TGV that bypass Paris were even without any chance to RES (also not for 20€), Strangely I got instead a 2 TGV link-with metro via Paris, to Lille, for just 10€/total for the 2 (some 4-5 weeks before trip).
All TGVs need resevations. At least the Eurostar and Thalys have a limited number of pass holder seats available.
What about the cross border TGVs
TGV Lyria (France-Switzerland) and recently Paris - Barcelona don't have a limited number of pass holder seats. That may also be the case for the TGVs to Luxembourg and Freiburg(Breisgau), which seem to be treated like domestic TGVs.
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