We are spending the first week in London and the last week in Paris.. After the week in London I have purchased train tickets ahead of time to Brussels from which we will travel to Bruges. I also have our tickets from Paris back to London. After Bruges we plan to sort of wander. Amsterdam, Munich, Vienna, and Switzerland are on the list. I plan on finding hotels as we go ( except London and Paris) because I wanted to leave the middle of the trip open to whatever comes up. My question is about train tickets. I have been looking into last minute tickets as opposed to rail passes. Would this be the time when passes are the way to go?

Walking into a hotel and asking for a room gets you the top rate. You need to look at laterooms.com or other websites and book a day or two in advance unless you have deep pockets. Another alternative is booking an Accor.com hotel -Ibis, Etap, etc. There rates stay close to the same- walk-in or book a week earlier and you pay per room, not per person. They might have a 2 or 3 Euro charge for the second person, but that is not too expensive.

Train tickets purchased early are cheaper than train tickets booked at last minute. I have never used a rail pass, so maybe someone else will chime in on them.

Thank you for your reply. I will have a computer with me to help with the hotel search as we decide where we want to go. This trip is sort of like the backpacking trip I never got to do when I was younger, without the backpacks. We've been to Italy a couple of times and had reservations for the whole trip. I just wanted to try something a little more unstructured.

Rail passes are usually not the best deals. You should have a look at train fares etc on the various sites such as SNCF.com, Thalys.com, bahn.de and get a feel for the price of tickets.

As far as hotels go, since you'll have a laptop you'll be able to use Priceline's "Name Your Own Price" feature. You can snag a 4 star hotel in Amsterdam these days for under $70. Dollars, not euros. Hotwire.com is also good for this but first learn how to work them to your advantage on
betterbidding.com and biddingfortravel.com

You should also be able to save a lot of money by using the net to find Bed and Breakfasts etc.

Sounds like you have a great trip coming up!

Rob

Many sites will recommend you go to the local tourist info office upon arrival and ask about rooms. Don't know if that will get you a good deal or not; we tend to set a framework itinerary with several prearranged stops/hotels and then improvise in between.

Be sure that you aren't heading to Munich during Octoberfest. You won't be able to find a room there unless you're ready to pay $$$$$.

If you don't have a set itinerary, I suppose a railpass may be cheaper than last-minute point-to-point tickets. However, a railpass that covers all those countries you listed will be quite expensive too. And don't forget that certain trains you need to pay extra for a reservation even if you have a railpass already. Obviously, you can travel for a lot cheaper if you buy discount train tickets in advance, but that will tie you down to a fixed itinerary.

If your budget is tight, you can consider taking buses for some trips instead of trains. Buses are cheaper and certainly their last-minute walk-up price is lower than trains.