RailEurope and Britrail
 

I'm in the middle of the time-consuming exercise of costing out rail pass vs. point to point tickets for our September UK trip, and was spending some time on the RE site. I noticed they offered point to point tickets also, so tried them to see what they came up with for one simple leg, Weymouth to London. I know from experience that it's a direct line to Waterloo, regular hourly service, and that an Apex ticket is about 25 GBP.

So imagine my surprise when the best RE could come up with was a trip via Bath, with a quoted 2nd class fare of $388!! :-0 What?!! That's casting doubt over the whole RE service in my mind. Anyone have any insights as to what is going on there?

It's silly they even quote that as they have an England Railpass that is much cheaper than that one train ticket!
RE is bad on UK trains but not always so in other countries. I assume this is some kind of glitch - RE doesn't sell very many routes in UK so they have a weird routing and ridiculous pricing. BritRail and RE are the same price i believe though they are different entities.

I hope that when you say "britrail" you mean going through www.nationalrail.co.uk & then booking with the rail company the trip is on

Actually the best Raileurope could have come up with if you talked to someone who knows something there would have been the LondonPlus Pass, which for $70 gives you two days of unlimited travel in southeast England - including from Weymouth to London - so at $35 a day this pass would be way cheaper than what their stupid point-point ticket price was. The LondonPlus pass is not sold in UK - if you pay APEX 25 pounds that's about $38 - best deal unless you could use the LondonPlus' other day on the 2-day pass. But with the LondonPlus you do not have to deal with APEX and can just hop on any train - say if you're landing in Weymouth and not certain of what train you can best catch. Other aspects of LondonPlus - can use on Gatwick Express but not Heathrow Express and not on line out of Paddington towards Bath - otherwise can use on nearly all the various train line companies in about a 100-mile radius of London - and just hop on - no restrictions. Also comes in first class at $106 p.p.
Groups benefit greatly as the third thru ninth people traveling together pay just 50% of what the first two pay, or $35 for a 2-day pass. Got kids under 16 - then they all get a free Family Pass to match what the first two adults pay. Off-peak travel - from Nov thru Feb all LondonPlus passes are 25% off the above prices. And if taking Eurostar to Paris or Brussels this pass qualifies you for the great $75 passholder fare - especially good as it can be used on any train any day - some weekend lowest fares can be $150 or more, in which case the pass could save you $5 or possible even much more, even if you threw it away (or save you $23 Nov-Feb or more) - or with groups of more than two can easily buy the LondonPlus pass then throw it away and save lots of bucks at certain times on Eurostars. Passes are marketed by RailEurope - they would charge a $15 mailing fee - in any case i always recommend BETS(800-441-2387; www.budgeteuropetravel.com for their UK and Eurostar expertise in my years of dealing with them and they would only charge a $5 fee for these passes.
Anyway the LondonPlus pass to me is way underpublicized for its many potential benefits. Also comes in 4 and 7-day versions.

Thanks PalQ, you have a wealth of helpful info. I'll check out the London Plus 2-day pass, it might be just what we need. ;-)

Yes, I do use the nationalrail site for point to point tickets -- good site, pretty easy to use. The maps and schedules really help with planning from overseas.

SB Travlr: the map of the 2006 LondonPlus coverage clearly indicates that Weymouth is just inside the coverage but i'd clarify that with BETS or someone else just to make sure. Weymouth is about as far out as the LondonPlus extends and you of course could not take the ridiculous RailEurope routing via Bath as Bath is outside the pass' scope and trains from Bath to Paddington in any case aren't value with the pass - but the more direct route Weymouth-London Waterloo certainly is.

You can get a fairly good idea of what works and what doesn't by entering your itinerary at http://www.railsaver.com/railsaver.asp and ticking "Only if railpasses save me money."

The site runs off rack rates, so if a carrier is offering a smokin' deal, it won't show up here. But generally, it does a good job at telling you if a pass is what you should get.

It says at the bottom of the London Pluss map that Weymouth is within the boundary.