You need to see if there are spaces on Eurostar first. Passholder places sell out weeks in advance. See the reservations section to see how to reserve places. Travel from Heathrow to London is easy. Buy an Oyster Card at Heathrow and this will cover all your London travel. Use the Elizabeth Line. Not valid on Heathrow Express.
The train from Paris to Zurich has an expensive supplement and must be reserved well in advance.
From Amsterdam to London you will have to change in Brussels as there only a handful of passholder places on this train.
You’ll arrive in London on a bank holiday weekend. London will be heaving! And you come back in time for the Coronation!
You may find getting accommodation may be difficult and expensive. If you have the chance fly to Paris instead and give London a miss this time.
This advice comes from a Brit. so I know what I’m talking about.
Heathrow - London would be a very expensive use of a Eurail pass. Either use London Underground or Elizabeth Line and connections with contactless credit/debit cards or if you are in a desperate rush pay more for Heathrow Express.
Travel around London pass is not valid for, use cards as above
London - Paris on April 30 is already sold out for Eurail holders. There are still seats left to Lille, you would have to change there for Paris.
Similarly, no availability from Amsterdam on 5 May, there is still some availability from Brussels.
Lots of questions - here are some answers.
A Global pass will allow you to travel into the centre of London on the Elizabeth Line trains but not the Heathrow Express. There is no reservation possible, but it runs regularly.
A Global pass does not include transport in London other than on the Elizabeth Line and the Overground trains operated by participating operators.
You are correct that a 5 day in a month pass allows you to travel on any 5 days in the month after you start your first journey. You can travel on as many trains as you wish on each travel day. A travel day is for trains scheduled to leave from 0000 to 2359 CET and you can stay onboard a train after midnight. Once you leave that train any further connection will require a new travel day.
Most of the trains you indicate require reservations, especially the Eurostar from and back to London. These are limited so you need to book these in advance - ask for the best way to do this.
There are a few ways of reducing the cost of some routings, especially to Zurich, but they mean changes.
The itinerary will give you very little time in any of these places,
Using high speed trains you will need to budget at least 100 euro for reservations, plus accommodation.
Buy an Oyster Card at Heathrow and this will cover all your London travel.
Is there any advantage over using a contactless card?
Buy an Oyster Card at Heathrow and this will cover all your London travel.
Is there any advantage over using a contactless card?
No.
Oyster cards now cost £7 which is not refundable. (Deposits on older cards bought before 2020 can be refunded)
TfL are heavily pushing contactless card use now over oyster and paper tickets.
Contactless is best unless the card issuer charges you for foreign transactions. I suspect many must do as Oyster cards are now marketed at visitors rather than domestic customers.
I didn’t know the £7 is non refundable. This changed last year
So almost everything has already been answered. Most of the trains you'll take have mandatory reservations but as train tickets are really expensive on those trains (Paris - London is at least 150€ on 30.04), a pass will still be worth it. Eurail Global Pass 5 days in a month.
- DAY 1 : London - Lille-Europe 30€ book ASAP, for example 09:01 - 11:26 (1h time difference)
- TGV Lille-Europe - Paris-Nord 12:05 - 13:23 OR 13:39 - 14:41 10€
- DAY 2 : TGV Paris-Est - Strasbourg 07:21 - 09:06 OR 07:58 - 09:59 10€
- TER Strasbourg - Basel SBB 09:21 - 10:40 reservation-free
- Basel SBB - Zürich HB 11:06 - 12:00 reservation-free
- DAY 3 : travel around Switzerland
- DAY 4 : Zurich HB - Basel SBB 06:59 - 07:53
- Basel SBB - Frankfurt (Main) Hbf 08:13 - 11:08
- Frankfurt (Main) Hbf - Amsterdam Centraal 11:26 - 15:53 (optional reservations for 4,50€ Zurich - Amsterdam)
- DAY 5 : IC Amsterdam Centraal - Bruxelles-Midi 16:28 - 19:17 reservation-free
- passport control for the UK made in Brussels so be about 45 min in advance
- Eurostar Bruxelles-Midi - London St. Pancras 20:55 - 21:57 30€ book ASAP (last train of the day
Another possibility would be to take the night train between Basel SBB (1h of Zurich) and Amsterdam on 3rd May. You then arrive in the morning of 4th May and have the full day to explore Amsterdam.
- Basel SBB - Amsterdam Centraal 23:13 - 09:58 44€ shared couchette book ASAP
Is Zurich really a must ? It's quite out of the way and you miss the best of Switzerland, the Alps. I'd rather focus on Paris, Brussels (day trips to Gent and Brussels) and Amsterdam. You'll basically have no time for Amsterdam which is a real shame.
Let us know for questions
Luggage are allowed on trains with no extra charges
