I am traveling from Frankfurt to Brussels, March 28 and 29th. I am going to Braubach on the 28th, then will leave from St Goar on the 29th, to arrive in Brussels no later than 6:30 PM.

In looking at the train schedules, I can leave St Goar as late as 1:32 on the 29th and still make it to Brussels in time.

I am not familiar with trains, have actually never taken anything other than an Amtrak once or twice. Can I purchase one ticket for the entire journey, or do I purchase a ticket from Frankfurt to Braubach, and another one from St Goar to Brussels?

usually one ticket for the entire journey. But if you take the Thalys train Cologne-Brussels you will need a separate Thalys ticket as prices on this train vary wildly (airplane like) whereas if you take the ICE trains Cologne-Brussels i think you'll have just one ticket.
In any case you can buy all your tickets in St Goar or at any train station.

Thanks, I do not think we will be taking the Thalys train, so we will just buy tickets for the regular trains.

re-reading your question. you will have a separate ticket probably Frankfurt-Barubach then one St Goar-Brussels if you take the German ICE Cologne-Brussels; reservations not compulsory on ICE but are on the more expensive Thalys trains.
Buy all your tickets at once at Frankfurt airport's train station if like. Or just use the automatic ticket machines.
Perhaps investigate the bargain Lander (regional) pass for the Frankfurt-Rhine area.

Can you tell me more about that pass? I googled the phrase, and can't come up with anything

www.bahn.de German rail web site and search for Lander Tickets - each region has a pass good for local and regional trains and is dirt cheap.

LarryinColorado has compiled an amazing amount of knowledge and search for him here. Hopefully he or some others with exact references will come on.

But such passes i believe cost about 20 euro and sometimes for the whole weekend. and i think up to five people may be able to use them.

not good on K-D boats i believe however but not sure.

Lander Passes or just ask at Frankfurt airport train station.

Thanks, from what I have read, it appears that a lander ticket will get all three of us from Frankfurt to the Rhine area for 25 euro. The ticket is valid from 9:00 am til 3:00 AM the following day. Did I read that correctly?

I am not surprised that you found nothing on Google under Lander Ticket. First thing, they are Länder (Laender) Tickets.

A German state is a Land; the plural is Länder. I am not quite sure why they call them Länder Tickets (states tickets), instead of Land Tickets (state tickets), but they do.

Anyway, the Land Ticket for the state of Rheinland-Pfalz is the Rheinland-Pfalz Ticket. It costs €25 for up to 5 people and is valid in all of the state of Rheinland-Pfalz plus Wiesbaden and the rail line on the right bank of the Rhein from Wiesbaden to Rüdesheim, St. Goarshausen, Braubach, and Koblenz. For the record, it is also valid on rail lines into Mannheim and Karlsruhe in Baden-Württemberg and into Bonn in Nordrhein-Westfalen. And it is valid from midnight on weekends or bank holidays, or from 9 AM on weekdays until 3 AM the following day. It is valid on all regional trains (IRE, RE, RB) and many buses in the area of validity (see /www.der-takt.de/fileadmin/Bilder/Karten/karte_rp_ticket.html).

You can buy the RLP (Rheinland-Pfalz) Ticket at any DB Reisezentrum throughout Germany for an additional €2 fee for personal assistance. You should also be able to buy it at any red/white/blue Bahn ticket automat. Within RLP, it will be available from the blue and white ticket machines of the Nahverkehr (regional rail).

You are coming from Frankfurt. You cannot use the RLP ticket all the way from Frankfurt, which is in the state of Hessen, not RLP. However, you can probably buy one from a red/white/blue DB automat in Frankfurt. You can buy it in advance, but pay attention to the date. Also, just before you leave Frankfurt, buy three RMV (Rhein-Main Verkehrsverbund) tickets for Frankfurt to Mainz or Wiesbaden, depending on which side of the Rhein you will travel on. In your case, I think it is Wiesbaden. These should cost €6,60 for an adult, €3,95 for a child under 15. I suspect that by the time you get to Wiesbaden and are ready to leave for Braubach, it will be after 9 AM.

By the way, there is a lot of good information about the RLP Ticket on www.der-takt.de, but it is in German.

This might be too much information too late, but I have compiled some of what I know about getting schedules from the Bahn website, Länder tickets, local transit districts, and using ticket automats on a website called Reise_Deutschland (www.geocities.com/reise_deutschland). Maybe it will help some.

Just some more trivia. When I was in Bacharach a few years ago, the station there was unmanned. That is, there was no ticket counter, just a Nahverkehr (regional trains) ticket automat in a big lonely room. I also did not see any signs of a counter in St. Goar. I didn't see an automat either, but there probably was one.

Anyway, don't expect to buy a ticket to Brussels at the station in St. Goar.

Larryincolorado,

BIG thanks to you. I needed every piece of the info you just gave me.