I am overwhelmed by all the information on
transportation passes.

We have 7 people, 5 over 18 and 2 kids.

We will be in
London
Bath
Stonehenge
York
Edinburgh
Loch Ness
Raasey Island
Plus we hope an overnight trip to Paris

What type of freaking railpass should we buy? Help, for God's sake help!

Do we pay as we go-is that cheaper?

Is London a whole separate pass system?

Help!

Thanks!

Since you seem to be mainly in GB, I would suggest you check out Rick Steves:

http://www.ricksteves.com/rail/greatbritain.htm

Railpasses ARE confusing! The Rick Steves site is a good recommendation. Type your itinerary into www.railsaver.com for a comparison of point-to-point tickets vs passes. You may even qualify for a group rate of some kind.

Try www.thetrainline.com for point to point tickets.
I would suggest looking at a Britrail pass, that allows so many days travel within a certain period of time. Eg. 4 days of travel in a two week period.
London Travelcards are completely separate, though your Britrail pass will allow you to use the Heathrow Express or Gatwick Express.
Go to www.thetube.com for London travel needs. Basically, you will get a daily or weekly zone 1 Travelcard, good for all buses, trains and Tubes within that zone. After 0930 it is cheaper, though you can use the post-0930 cards on buses before then, and use any Zone card for all buses. Eg Zone 1 will do you right for all buses across the four zones.

Frustrated are we? No wonder...

Rail passes are generally a good deal if you are traveling by rail frequently over a relatively short timeperiod. The www.railsaver.com site appears to have info. that will help, but I've never used this service. They refer you to an associated vendor (www.railconnection.com) where you can purchase tickets and have them delivered for a reasonable fee.

If you know the specific times and routes you want to take, advanced purchase rail tickets (APEX) are often as good a deal as passes.

The problem is purchasing those tickets if you do not reside in the UK. Two vendors, thetrainline.com and qjump.com, allow online purchases of tickets that you can pick up at a number of rail stations in the UK (they also mail tickets to a UK address...perhaps your first hotel). Also, certain train operating companies sell tickets online--with generally similar delivery/pickup limitations. The Railsaver/RailConnection service appears to sell APEX tickets too.

You can look at rail schedules for the UK, without purchasing, at:

http://www.rail.co.uk

This site also has links to the operating companies (there are dozens of companies that run trains in the UK).

As for London, yes, there is a "whole separate pass system". I almost hesitate to say that. Here's a website that will confuse, er, inform you:

http://www.londontransport.co.uk/tfl/nftt_tcards.shtml

Of the myriad of choices here, the Visitor Travelpass is often a good deal for tourists, and the daily family pass is another good bet.

Hope this helps a bit.

David White
http://www.KidsToLondon.com

As others have said, read the railpass guide at www.ricksteves.com and check out www.railsaver.com to get help in comparing the cost of a pass to buying point-to-point tickets. If you get a BritRail pass, you can use it to get discounted tickets on the Eurostar to Paris and back for any day of the week. Note that you'll use two "pass days" to do this, however. If you can go to Paris on Saturday and return on Sunday, it will be to your advantage to not use any "pass days," so long as you buy your tickets well in advance (14 days minimum and 60 days for the best price). Visit www.eurostar.com for all the prices.