ellen75005

My daughter is doing an internship in Sarajevo this summer and plans to spend two weeks in August traveling in Eastern Europe. She’s specifically interested in Vienna, Prague, Krakow and Budapest. Not surprisingly, it looks like trains are cheaper than flying. Does anyone know if buying tickets as she goes at the train stations is cheaper than buying them (or a Eurrail pass) on a website such as RailEurope? She’s heard that there’s a significant markup online.

molker

Do not use Rail Europe - tickets at high markups compared to buying directly and also extra charges for mailing etc.
Their published schedules often incomplete or just wrong.



many , many discounted tickets for travel by buying in advance..
for an example look to the austrian rail site

www.oebb.at

many rail to adjacent countries for 19- 39 euro

and other national rail line sites have similar or better offers.

Sher

I only know some things about tickets between Krakow and Budapest as I am doing that for part of my trip.
Rail Europe will sell the tickets but they are very expensive.
The best place to buy tickets between these two cities is in Krakow.
The train trip is about eight hours. You can buy them for daylight trips or a sleeper. Advance tickets are more reasonable but we are talking way in advance. For example, a sleeper car for two and the ticket would be about E98 but purchased in advance it would be about E49. I cannot remember exactly how much the train is itself because I am going by sleeper.
She can also look into the bus which I am told is comfortable and would only be about E25. It still takes about the same amount of time.

Palenque

If she is traveling enough on trains then consider the European East Railpass - this lets you hop on any train or just about any anytime - tickets molker describes are train-specific and require advance booking and if she knows exactly what trains she wants to take and will not change (non-refundable i think) and book far in advance and only taking a few trips then that would be the cheapest.
But for flexibility to just show up the railpass could be a great deal if doing several train rides. For lots on trains in Eastern Europe and passes i always highlight these super sites - www.seat61.com; www.ricksteves.com; www.budgeteuropetravel.com

bratsandbeer

We usually buy our tickets at the station, however, I have used RailEurope to make overnight train reservations. I have been very satisfied with RailEurope. The cost was no more than other websites.

For shorter travel distances, it is cheaper to purchase at the station than to go through Rail Europe. We will buy several tickets at one time at the station for different trips we will be taking. We have also just gone to the station the day before we plan to travel and buy the ticket.

We have used a pass before - you can add up the costs of individual tickets against the cost of the pass and see which is cheaper.

tenmom

Make sure she asks about stops, how many on her routes. My daughter got off the train (we were still on it) as she thought it was our stop...we had been told it was a non-stop. We also found out the hard way that a ticket didn't mean a seat...ask for a reservation. That is how we ended up sitting in different areas of the train from Vienna to Budapest.

Palenque

Yes seat reservations are optional on many trains - a ticket or railpass only guarantees you can board the train not that there will be an empty seat - in first class you rarely will not find quite a few empty seats and that is a perk of a first-class ticket or pass - i always it seems put my luggage on an adjoining or opposite empty seat - in 2nd class expect to be foraging for space in crowded overhead luggage racks.

Seat reservations can be made and only cost a few euros and you can request a window or aisle seat, etc.

As for railpasses the Eastern European pass is a better deal in first class because the price differential i think is significantly less than the usual difference in price between a first and second class ticket.

IME i would definitely advise first class in Eastern Europe - for the relatively small extra bucks you will have a much more leisurely journey.

ellen75005

Thank you all so much for your responses. My daughter is looking at these, too, and I'm sure will learn a lot and heed your advice. She knows uncomfortable, having ridden on Russian trains, but she hasn't traveled by train in any other area of Eastern Europe, so this is all good information.

Ellen

Palenque

The mainline trains say between Prague and Vienna or Vienna and Budapest, etc are up to western European standards but IME the sideline trains can look like something out of the Soviet era - wooden benches, etc.

Most trains she will take should be comfortable and not at all like Russian trains - especially Russian trains in 'hard class'!

ellen75005

Palenque, she did mention that she wanted to avoid the Russian bench-type trains. And she's going to avoid overnight trains if possible which makes me happy