I’d choose Florence over Milan for the reasons mentioned above
Sorry, my mistake. My comment above refers to the Bernina Express.
Re the Glacier Express - isn’t just the special panorama coaches that need a reservation - the carriages at either end of the panorama ones are reservation-free I believe. About the Glacier Express : the special panorama train requires a 49 CHF reservation (very popular so book in advance). You can also travel on reservation-free hourly regional trains on the same route. :)
So lower capacity due to lack of double deck trains but presumably not half the number of seats?!Of course we can just go to Basel for 11am, take a look at the 1103 to Milan and if it looks too crowded then take the 1106 instead via the Bernina….A possible last question - if you know the answer - is how does the “Old Scenic Railway” route, being taken instead of the Gothard Base tunnel route, compare to the Bernina Route for scenery, atmosphere, etc.?
Thanks.Yes, I wouldn’t normally bother with seat reservations.I had assumed that if the trains are taking an hour longer then they can’t run as many trains and hence the trains that do run are going to be more crowded.However from what you say, it doesn’t seem to be the case?Regarding the Bernina Railway, in your experience, have there always been vacant seats in the no-reservations-required bits of the Bernina Express (ie the front & back carriages)?
Where are you coming from?
I took the Bernina Express last month with an Interrail pass and just sat in the first carriage where the seats don’t require reservations. It’s a modern carriage with wide windows, tables, toilet etc. The carriages which require reservations have taller windows but - for the journey I took - were more crowded. The train stops for 30mins in the middle at a view point with a café which is when I saw the other carriages.
It can be confusing at first! Which trains were you trying to book?
That’s the £51 price per person for sharing a 2 bed cabin which doesn’t sound too bad. It’s £122 per person without the interrail.
Hi Thanks for your input.Croatia sounds good but without crossing the Adriatic twice, it’s difficult to get down to Greece from there.London - Bern (overnight stop) - Milan for overnight train to Bari is sounding good to me although possibly replacing Strasbourg for Bern would work well too. The attractions to me of both the above are that I don’t have to go through Cologne or Paris Gare de Lyon (only because I’ve been to both enough times) and my route down to Milan is via Brig which is a line I’ve not taken.I’ll research what the cost might be for 2 people on the Italian sleeper for our own berth..
The outbound/inbound rule says that you can travel on a maximum of 2 travel days in your country of residence. You can use as many trains as you like and there are no restriction for the travel. So if I needed to do long distance journeys on 2 different days in my own country of the UK, I could buy an international pass and just use the 2 inward/outward days without any intention to leave the UK?
I notice that https://www.sncf.com/en/customer-service/exchanges-cancellations says “To get a refund on your TGV INOUI, TER or INTERCITÉS train ticket (including travel outside France), contact the original seller.”As the Barcelona train which was cancelled was an Inoui ticket, does that suggest that I should be applying to eurail rather than SNCF in this instance?I think that I would be looking for the cost of the flixbus, the 2 tram connections each end plus 1/16 of the Interrail price as I was more than 120 minutes delayed. Does that sound correct?
Thanks for the further input - one thing that the inoui guy did say was that I should take up any complaints with the people I booked through - ie interrail. Does that sound correct please?
By way of an update……….I hadn’t mentioned that I was going from Barcelona to Montpellier the day before as I’d not received any notice of any disruption on that route. But, when I got to Barcelona Sants I saw that that train was suspended too.I spoke to the inoui representative who - while pleasant enough - had no options for me apart from to fly to London. I suggested that they had a requirement to provide me with an alternative passage including a hotel if required. He said that he knew nothing about this and that it would be impractical because the strike could go on for days. I showed him the email from sncf showing my train change from Montpellier to Paris for the next day and he expressed surprise as he considered it unlikely that it would run.I therefore took a flixbus using the sncf app to Montpellier at a cost of 70 Euros. This journey was about 3 or 4 hours longer.The next morning I went to the station to take the train sncf had emailed me to take (albeit that my reservation
Hi. No particular guidance to give as I’ve never stayed there but fyi, it’s a pleasant walk through the old town, through the more modern shopping area to the main station. There’s also a small bus that runs a similar route and the app, Moovit seems to have the times of it accurately.Rimini was a real positive surprise to me - long beach promenade as expected but plus a surprise proper old town area running to the river.
Thanks to everyone for their input. I’ve just managed to get through to sncf on the telephone and they have moved the reservation to a 0917 train from Nimes. So the last problem I have is to decide how reliably I will be able to get from Montpellier to Nimes tomorrow morning before 0917. There are a number of trains showing as not cancelled but I don’t know - on this strike day - how accurate the timetable will be..
Thank you so much for your reply. I tried SNCF But they are closed until 8 o’clock tomorrow morning. I can try the musical chairs approach going from Montpellier but I wonder how I would get onto the platform?
One thing I would say for your planning is don’t underestimate the loveliness of the Greek mainland too. I’ve travelled across a lot of Greece and often by train - one can go to Volos and then a bus to the Pelion region or to Corinthos for history or Diakopto for walking and experiencing the rack railway high up into the mountains.
A good reminder of that, thanks. Unfortunately I didn’t think of that until I was at the ferry terminal buying a ticket for the same day. One other point, on the way out I booked online and had to falsely state my age on the Superfast webpage as otherwise it insisted on giving me an age-related discount due to my real age which was much less generous that the Inter rail discount.
I went from London to Greece using an interrail 4 days in 30 pass. And then another pass to bring me back a few months later. The Superfast ferry Italy to Greece was at a substantial discount because I had the pass. This was despite having used all the 4 days by the day we were due to get the ferry. Because the pass was still within its validity period, it was accepted. However on the way back, it appeared that I had to use a travel day to get the discount on the ferry because - I think - the pass treats the first day of validating the pass as a travel day. The discount brought the price down to 27 Euros for a journey Bari to Igoumenitsa or Patras without a cabin.
https://rodalies.gencat.cat/en/linies_estacions_i_trens/index.html?linia=r3It’s a Rodalies train - you can’t reserve seats and - according to the Reddit page I ended up on when Googling - you just show your pass on board.If that day you are only doing that Latour to Barcelona trip, you may however want to just pay the relatively cheap fare and preserve one of your pass’s travel days.
I did Patras to Bari last week on Superfast and the price was reduced to from €72 to €27. It was about €20 more to go to Ancona. It did use up a travel day as you need to activate the pass. However on the way down there (Bari to Igoumenitsa) , I’d used up my 4 days but because the pass was within the one month period, Superfast accepted it and gave me the same discount.
All went well - in light of the comments received I just waited until I got to the station and bought the reservation there for the next train. It might have been due to the clocks changing overnight but the ferry was early and I was on land 10 minutes before the ferry was due to arrive.Incidentally, although there is a bus, I walked from ferry to station and it was about 30 minutes. Bari seemed a nice town to me - but of course I just saw the old town and the shopping areas.
You can walk from Hendaye to Irun - it’s a nice feeling to walk across the pedestrian bridge crossing the river and crossing from France to Spain. But there is also the small Euskotren which you can take. Depending on timings (and the fact that you have to pay a few Euros for this local train, you could get it to San Sebastian and get the Renfe train from there maybe. San Sebastian is a nicer place to change if you have a few hours. Regarding booking reservations on Renfe trains, you can I believe book them by telephone and they hold the reservation for a few days before you pick them up at a station
I experienced a very similar situation - ie checked availability before buying the pass and then 5 minutes later after buying the pass found it wasn’t available. Then checked without saying I had a pass and it again says it’s available...As detailed here
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