Hello fellow travelers!

Me and my boyfriend will be travelling Spain in the next weeks. My only other backpack experience was accross the UK where coaches are very cheap (1-10£ for quite a long way). While checking for intercity transport, we realised that we wouldn't find a bus under approx 40€ (so expensive for us canadians right now) and that trips would require way longer than we thought. I also checked for train, that is about thrice the price for the same ride but at least won't have you waste an entire day. We read about renfe passes that are around 500€ for a predetermined number of trips.

We arrive and leave from Madrid and expected to go up to the north coast (2-3 cities), through Barcelona and finally Seville/Granada. That means around 7-8 transportations and so much more money than we planned.

Are there other options I didn't consider? What would you recommand?

Thank you!

Did you check prices for trains if you booked ahead of time on the renfe.com site? I got some quite good discounts last year doing that.

The renfe.com site can be a pain to get to work for north americans at least it seems from the litany of complaints on Fodor's - check www.seat61.com for advice on alternative sites for cheaper fares and for general info also www.ricksteves.com. The Spain Eurailpass seems cheaper than the Renfe pass you qoute (info: http://www.budgeteuropetravel.com/id30.html).

Check advance-purchase point to point fares at www.captaintrain.com - this now does Renfe tickets in euros, same prices and same print-at-home tickets as Renfe and no added fee, but far easier to use.

Compare with the Renfe Spain pass. Reservations must be made to go with this, but they are free.

The Eurail Spain pass is usually more expensive (I had thought) but in any case, you need to make reservations at roughly €10 a time on all fast trains in Spain.

Spain Eurail costs about $50/day flexi saverpass - I do not know how many days the OP needs - a Youthpass for those under 26 is a bit cheaper so perhaps the RENFE Pass is cheaper, especially given the 10 Euro supplement on Eurail (prices from www.budgeteuropetravel.com)

I guess with fall of euro makes Eurails more expensive though Eurail has been lowering prices of British and other passes - compare both.

Another option -- quite drastic! -- is to limit your journey to a smaller geographic region. Good luck!

Yes less can indeed be more!