rmgood

I have now completed my hotel reservations for our 4 week trip to Austria and Italy. Can someone please give me some detail on the best way to make train reservations; What is the best Web site to use? Do you get vouchers that you print out and take to the train station? What then? Any detail and insight would be appreciated.

Dukey1

Usually, and I will say it again: USUALLY, you cannot book for more than 3-4 months out. Be aware that major timetable changes happen in July which can impact the loading of those schedules into train site data bases.

You can use www.trenitalia.com OR www.italiarail.com. The latter is a re-seller which charges a VERY small markup and some of us find that latter site easier to use.

Some tickets you can print out at home; others you may be given a PNR which you input into ticket machines to retrieve the tickets.

Dukey1

Sorry, the Austrian rail site is www.oebb.at/en/

ElendilPickle

There is also ItaloTreno http://www.italotreno.it/EN/Pages/default.aspx when you want a fast train between cities. We used a combination of this and ItaliaRail.

Lee Ann

greg

Where are you going? Have you booked hotels in towns/cities with good train connections?
If the route is served by regional slow trains, there is no merit in buying tickets online for Italy.

For Austria, there are several discount package depending on when and where you intend to travel. Einfach-Raus is just one of the offerings:
http://www.oebb.at/en/Tickets/Groups...cket/index.jsp

Dukey1

Italotreno is not the only provider of "fast" trains between cities.

kybourbon

Trenitalia is Italy's state rail company and has the majority of trains although there are some private lines depending on area.

Italo only operates between a few major cities and in some of those does not use the main stations so you may have to transfer within a city on other public transport.

Italiarail is a reseller that charges a fee and also marks up the ticket price in the conversion (DCC). For best prices, use the official train companies, not resellers.

In Italy, depending on your itinerary, some places are better served by buses than trains (Siena for one). For some smaller towns, train stations are outside the towns and then you have to find other transport to the center while buses drop at the historic centers. Price and travel time are often the same. Many small towns don't have train service at all so it just depends where you are going.

Also in Italy, the fast trains serve major cities and don't stop at most smaller cities/towns. Regional trains serve smaller cities (Pisa, Lucca, Orvieto, etc.). Regional trains don't have reservations at all and many have only one class. You can buy tickets for regional trains on Trenitalia 7 days in advance, but they have more restrictions than if you wait and just buy them in Italy. There is no advantage to buying them in advance as there are no discounts, no reserved seats and don't sell out.

If you state your itinerary, we can point you to the best transport option for each link.

PalenQ

www.seat61.com is the guru of online discounted tickets - but keep in mind that those tickets are often sold in limited numers so must be booked in stone weeks/months in advance - change refunds usually not permitted but the savings over full fare walk up tickets can be huge.

Other good infmorative train sites are www.ricksteves.com and www.budgeteuropetravel.com - for general info on what to expect on European trains like the difference between first and second class (IMO there is a significant difference to others hardly none; discounted tickets also come in first class often.

And kybourbon who posts above has shown to be an absolute font of knolwedge about European trains - she knows everything and will gladly help others who try to book online and may, not unusually it seems, have trouble actually getting the sites to work.

flanneruk

"Italo only operates between a few major cities and in some of those does not use the main stations so you may have to transfer within a city on other public transport. "

Unless you're determined to stay in a hotel in the same building as a railway station (with the possible exception of a few poshish hotels built into London mainline termini, never a good idea), you're going to have to transfer from ANY station to a hotel or flat. Self-evidently, by public transport: who's got time to hang around a taxi queue?

Public transport links (and taxis) from Milan's Porta Garibaldi and Rome's Tiburtina stations (used by Italotreno) are as good - and, for some destinations better - than those at Milan Centrale and Rome Termini, where all government-operated trains call.

Unlike the bureaucrats' trains, though, Italotreno now stops at BOTH Rome Tiburtina and Termini.

The "few major cities" Italotreno services (with at least as high a density of high-speed services as the government provides) are Naples, Rome, Florence, Bologna, Reggio-Emilia, Milan, Turin, Padua and Venice. Unless you really want to go to Sicily, I can't think of another city in Italy anyone would call "major"

bvlenci

Your knowledge of Italian geography is pitiable, if those are the only major cities you can think of outside of Sicily. Even to most of the cities you mention, service is limited on Italo. Italo has five daily trains from Rome to Padova. Trenitalia has eighteen.

<< Unless you're determined to stay in a hotel in the same building as a railway station (with the possible exception of a few poshish hotels built into London mainline termini, never a good idea), you're going to have to transfer from ANY station to a hotel or flat. Self-evidently, by public transport: who's got time to hang around a taxi queue? >>

I usually stay fairly close to Termini station, and walk to my hotel. Even if you're staying further from the station, a trip to Tiburtina adds quite a lot of time and complication to your trip.

I also don't see why it's self-evident that you should get to your hotel using public transportation. Both buses and taxis have their place. At rush hour, I wouldn't really want to travel on a bus with luggage, unless it were minimal.

Italo doesn't have many trains that stop at Termini. Most still operate only from Tiburtina or Ostiense. There is a much wider choice of bus and metro service from Termini station, and for most people, who generally stay in central Rome, a taxi would be cheaper from there.

PalenQ

tiburtina to me is a much easier calmer station to navigate and as flanner says connections via metro or cab from there are about the same as Termini - a plus to me vs a very chaotic Termini station.

kybourbon

>>>Unless you're determined to stay in a hotel in the same building as a railway station (with the possible exception of a few poshish hotels built into London mainline termini, never a good idea), you're going to have to transfer from ANY station to a hotel or flat<<<

If you are passing through a city or need to connect to another train, it can be a problem with Italo if you arrive across town at one station and need to taxi to another. They don't even connect all the major cities (you can't go from Venice to Milan on Italo like you can on Trenitalia).

For anyone currently searching trains on Trenitalia, I noticed a glitch last night. Trenitalia did some website upgrades over the weekend and not all trains are showing when you search them. I was looking at some small towns outside of Venice that should be showing and it kept returning an error. I tried multiple towns in the area with stations and all returned errors. I'm sure they are in the process of loading summer fares/promos, etc. so they should have it fixed soon. I haven't checked to see if other areas are affected.

bvlenci

Do you really think they're loading summer schedules in February? That would be a first!

By the way, the summer schedules take effect in mid-June, not July.

kybourbon

It's almost March. I don't know if they are loading them yet, but they are upgrading the website. I've since checked some other schedules. Malpensa Aeroporto to Milan is resulting in error as is Fiumicino to Rome. I've also checked Chiusi to Siena and got the error. Not summer, but was checking within the next 7 days.

Trenitalia has loaded some info about booking in English over the weekend which was only in Italian in the past.

PalenQ

Unlike the bureaucrats' trains, though, Italotreno now stops at BOTH Rome Tiburtina and Termini.>

Personally I'd rather get off at Tiburtina and avoid the masses and potential pickpockets at Termini. Plus it would be there about 15 minutes before it limps into Termini I'd hazard.

jeep61

Yes, the summer schedule appeared when I went to make reservations from Milano Centrale to Bologna Centrale in late June. Tickets purchased on the Trenitalia site. Even though I was purchasing tickets 120 prior to travel the cheapest ones were gone. I guess the Europeans scooped up the cheap ones while we in the US were sleeping. In general all went well and the charges already appear on my credit card - within minutes! In about another week I will do another set of tickets. Hope the second batch works as well.

kybourbon

I think your tried to buy your tickets too soon before Trenitalia had all the fares loaded. I see loads of 9€ fares from Milan/Bologna in the last half of June (I used the flexible date search which shows a week at a time). Trenitalia has always loaded things in bits and drabs (in the past, at the last minute - early June). The last few years they have been doing a bit better and getting schedules in earlier, but not all at once. It may be weeks before they have everything loaded. The only day that didn't have 9€ fares was June 28th (the last day currently available to purchase because of the 120 days) and those tickets are 19€. June 14-28 all had multiple trains with 9€ fares this morning.

rmgood

Thanks. My train routes for my trip are
Villach, Aut - Venice
Venice - Florence
Florence - Naples (Amalfi Coast)
Naples - Rome
Stresa - Zurich

jeep61

I found the ticket prices a bit quirky. We (eight people-5 adults and 3 kids) needed a specific date and a specific time for our Milan to Bologna train travel. We also wanted to all be in the same "carriage". So I took the cheapest offer for the first part of our group (63 euro for 2 kids and 2 adults) and then when I did the second set (3 adults and 1 kid) the lowest fare in the same class was twice that amount - - all within a couple of minutes. It would be much easier if Trenitalia did not limit the number of tickets purchased at one time - if I could do all eight of us on one transaction it would have been better. Still and all - - much cheaper than the base fare. Their web site states that ticket prices change based on demand, time and dates. I think my "demand" for four tickets changed the price for my second purchase. Next time the first group will be a party of five - the largest group allow on a single transaction.

bvlenci

It's quite possible that there weren't 8 of the cheapest (Super Economy) on that particular train from the start. On some very popular routes, especially at the most desirable times of the day, there may not even be any Super Economy tickets.

If you do your search for a group of five, you may not find any Super Economy fares, because they don't do a mix of fares, whereas for a group of three, there might be a Super Economy fare available.

You might want to try a second group of two adults and one child to see if you get the cheapest fare for those three people; and if not, try it for one adult and one child. That way, you'd get the maximum possible number of Super Economy fares, if there are any left at all.