How much should I expect to pay for an overnight train with shared sleeper compartment from Budapest to Prague?

Which night train did you have in mind? The only one I see is EN 476, gets into Prague at 03:29 - a horrible time to get there, and not a safe place at that time, either.

http://plannerint.b-rail.be/bin/quer...n?L=profi&
and
http://www.oebb.at/
and
http://www.budgeteuropetravel.com/index.html
and
www.bahn.de

Hi Reid:

It's been awhile since I was in Prague, but I agree with DalaiLlama on this one... that's not somewhere I'd want to be dropped at 3 a.m.

And being that it's a long train ride (7 hours), you might think about flying instead. SmartWings flies between the two cities. Here is their website: http://www.smartwings.com/ticket/home.php. Just plugging in a random date, a one way ticket was €55. I'd imagine that's cheaper than an overnight train ticket and it would save you a considerable amount of time.

Best of luck!

According to the Thomas Cook timetable, train 476, leaving Budapest at 1958, also has sleeping cars for Praha which are detatched at Breclav and then go to Praha by a different route to arrive at 0622. In summer, these sleepers are in a separate train which leaves Budapest at 1940 and gets to Praha at 0622. This train shows on www.bahn.de if you pick a date in June.

Overnight trains are great but if all the cheapies are sold then they are expensive. If you can't get a discounted ticket for the service mentioned by GH I would look at taking day trains/buses. Loads of ways of getting from Budapest to Vienna. And then train it from there - five a day and no need to book. If you left Budapest early you could do the trip in a day. Alternatively Vienna is worth a stop if you haven't visited already.

Cheers.

Train 476 goes through, you can verify it on the Czech site among others:
http://czech-transport.com/index.php?id=496

It does stop in Breclav for 27 minutes, so it is possible that the train is being taken apart there (good luck sleeping through that...). Although 476 with couchettes goes on to Prague where it arrives at 03:29.

That train from Cook would be a nasty way to go:.

The 476 train from Budapest gets in 12 minutes before midnight in Breclav and goes on to Prague. The train for Prague that gets to Prague at 6:22AM leaves Breclav at 1:27AM.

it is a different train, R470 even in June, so OP would have to get off his bunk on one train,wait around in Breclav, board another train and hope his new bunk at 1:27AM was vacant... Good luck!

But just in case the couchette carriages from Budapest are indeed separated from 476 - and attached to the R470 leaving at 01:27AM:

Tthat regional R470 train slow-coaches it to Prague with twelve stops en route - no chance you sleep a wink, with all the door slammings, announcements, comings and goings all night long.

Note that 476 does not run on Saturdays from Feb. 1 to June 12, and does not run on Feb. 27 and on the dates from May 24 to June 5.

Anyway, as Reid777 can see, night train is not an option on this route.

The sleeping cars which arrive is Praha at 0329 are the ones that go to Berlin. The sleeping car(s) for Praha are detached from the Berlin train and get to Praha at 0622 (the couchettes do not do this, so couchette passengers can only get to Praha at 0329). The train number is different because the carriages are attached to a different train, but passengers do not have to change trains or even get out of bed. For some reason, these complicated arrangements do not appear on www.bahn.de. In June, www.bahn.de clearly shows through sleeping cars from Budapest to Praha, arriving at 0622.
It will not be the most comfortable overnight journey in Europe, but would maximise your time in the two cities. Daytime Eurocity trains take about severn hours between Budapest and Praha and have a restaurant car; there is no need to change in Wien or anywhere else.

The Hungarian railways have this information in Hungarian:
www.mav-start.hu/utazas/csehorszag.php

This shows both trains, the Metropol (train 476), arriving in Praha at 0327, and the Amicus (476/470), arriving at 0621.
The supplement for a berth in a three-berth sleeping compartment on the Amicus is 14 euros which is coincidentally the same as for a berth in a six-berth couchette compartment on the Metropol. On the Amicus, a berth in a two-berth compartment is 21 euros, and a single berth compartment is 49 euros (which requires a first class ticket - the others need only a second-class ticket).

Thanks for all the input. This is my first time on this site and I really appreciate all the replies. I tried to look into Smartwings, but they keep telling me there are no available flights on the days I want - Sept. 10th or 11th. Do you think that is because it is too far in advance? There actually will be 12 of us. Are there any other airlines I can check into? Thanks again, Reid777

TTT

Smartwing has not posted any Budapest-Prague flights beyond April 25 (the 2:30 departure) - earlier dates for the other flights - did you look up the Timetables link?

So keep looking and when your timeframe pops up, book it.

And keep looking at alternatives. For such a large group I would engage http://www.budgeteuropetravel.com/index.html
to help you get a group discount and take a train like the 15:28 that gets into Praha hl.n. at 22:31. By midnight you're checked in and asleep.