Eurail Pass - Traveling Europe

• Barry Badrinath

  Somewhat inspired by the vacation thread. I have been planning a 2-3 month trip across Europe this summer as it is the last chance I will really have to see the world before I begin my PhD.
  
  Does anybody have any experience traveling Europe or with the Eurail pass and train system? I've just begun looking in to it and mapping out my itinerary. I'm very interested in going off the grid and exploring small towns/villages/communities and really immersing myself in the culture. At the same time, I definitely plan on visiting must see sites and spending some time in the big cities.
  
  What are some of your must see stops and other places you would suggest going? Restaurants, monuments, museums, towns, villages, cities, resorts, etc.
• swamisez

  

  If you are traveling that long and to that many countries the eurail pass is worth it. You need to take at least 10 rail trips to make it worth your time. Given the amount of time you are spending there and theplaces you hope to visit, I would recommend.
  
  Eurail gets you on trains, last minute openings for the most part and puts you in coach.
  
  You can fly to Edinburgh and take the trains all through England then go to London and take the TGV across the channel to mainland Europe. From there I would recommend spending lots of time in Paris and the small towns in the Loire Valley or Bordeaux region. It is beautiful and is a cultural goldmine for the art enthusiast or historian. France then south to Italy, Switzerland, Austria, north to the Czech Rep. then to Germany. Too many good times to recall, but can tell you that I drank so much beer my kidneys began to suffer. Thankfully the health care system helped me get nursed back to health.
  
  I love Spain, my favorite country to visit by far. But the Eurail pass gets funky when you involve the Spanish renfe system. They seem to really screw you over and make it hard to get in and out of Madrid or Barcelona. Otherwise, its a great time.
• FatHobbit

  

  Here is my very incomplete list of touristy places to visit
  
  Paris
  - Eiffel tower
  - Arc de triomphe
  - the louvre
  - notre dame
  - boat tour on the seine
  - there are many other museums but I can't recommend one over any of the others
  
  Amsterdam
  - Red light district
  - Anne Frank museum
  - canal tour
  - skip the sex museums. It sounded cool , but they are terrible and full of old porn
  
  Den Hague Netherlands
  - peace palace
  
  I'm a sucker for castles and there are many in southern germany that are cool to visit
  
  Berlin Germany
  - check point charlie and the wall
  - Brandenburg gate
  - Alexander platz
  - berlin tv tower
  - Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial church
  - Reichstag (the seat of parliament, you may need to make arrangements ahead of time for the tour but I think it's worth it)
  - Holocaust Museum
  - Kuedamm for shopping (it is to Berlin what michigan ave is to Chicago)
  
  Potsdam Germany (this will be more interesting if you have watched the movie 'the good german')
  - Sansoucci royal palace
  
  Munich Germany
  - Oktoberfest if you time your visit correctly
  - Allianz Arena if you are a soccer fan
  - dachua concentration camp
  - hofbrauhaus
  
  Neuschwanstein Castle (if you only see one castle in Germany, this should be the one. Hohenschwangau is right beside it and is IMHO more authentic but you can see both in one day)
  
  Nuremburg Germany
  - Kaiserburg
  - I also went to a spring festival here that was fun but that will depend on the timing of when you go
  
  Rothenburg Germany
  - christmas market
  - take the city tour. It's cheap and pretty good.
  
  Salzburg Austria
  - Hohensalzburg fortress (it looked cool, but we couldn't actually figure out how to get to it)
  - Mozart's birthplace (we walked up and down the street several times looking for it and almost didn't notice the sign on the second floor in two foot letters that indicated the house he was born in)
  
  Vienna Austria
  - Schoenbrunn palace
  
  Verona Italy
  - cool to me just because it's where Romeo and Juliet was set
  - skip Juliet's balcony (there was no real Juliet, so the balcony is just a tourist trap)
  - there is also an old cool Roman arena (wikipedia says it's the third largest in Italy)
  
  Venice Italy (very expensive - we had lunch on the canal and found out after there was a 6 euro charge per person for eating outside. There are no cars so you have to walk everywhere which is only a little confusing.)
  - the bridge of sighs
  - the Doge's palace
  - the Rialto bridge and market
  - St mark's square and the San Marco Basilica (I did not pay to go in, but be sure you look for the lagoon. the first day we walked there to see the church, but had no interest in going inside so we turned around. When I later looked at the map, had we walked to the church and looked left we would have been right on the water (lagoon?) and there was much more to see and a lot of souvenir shops)
  - venice island tour (murano, burano and torcello) you can take one of these tours from St Mark's square and I thought they were definitely worth it
  - gondola ride. I think you have to take a gondola ride if you are in Venice. They are more expensive at night, but I read ahead of time if you find out when the price changes you can take the ride just before the switch and get the better view at a slighty cheaper price. I think we paid 100 euros for the ride but what's the point in going if you aren't going to ride in a gondola on the canal?
• ricola

  

  I did the exact same thing...quite a few years ago when I was single/just before I got married. It was well worth it/was glad i did it. I went about 5 weeks, which was good for me. Spent a couple weeks in Brtain before heading to the continent. Tended to try to go off the beaten path--visiting small towns non touristy areas. helps to know the language if you do that. I knew enough german to get by, which served me well in germany/Austria/switz. Can get by a bit better in the cities knowing only English.
  Places i enjoyed the most were Cologne, Munich (I actually was there at Oktoberfest(in september btw)--which is an experience, but unless you are there to get hammered (which most people are) a bit overrated),Venice, but a lot of small towns in germany and Austria. taking the train through the Alps in Switzerland was also awesome.
• BigAppleBuckeye

  

  Been to Europe and have taken advantage of the rail system extensively: took a train from Amsterdam to Paris, then Paris to Freiburg (with a connection), then Freiburg to Munich. Also did the train trip of Venice-Florence-Rome. Very easy to figure out and a huge number of Europeans speak English, so you should have no issues. Next visit, would love to see the South of France, and Spain.
• Barry Badrinath

  I'm really not that big in to Museums, and though I think it would be cool to explore England, I really have no interest in the UK. There are definitely some big cities I want to hit such as Paris, Barcelona, Milan, and Amsterdam but otherwise I'm really looking to travel the places most people don't go and just interact with the people.
  
  Right now I'm trying to figure out the most cost and travel efficient ways to hit the aforementioned cities as well as Switzerland, Hungary, Croatia, and the Czech Republic to explore my roots before ending up in Sweden. My main concern is finding the cheapest cities to fly in to as a start point and fly out of at the conclusion of the trip while allowing me to circle through the continent in between. Cost allowing, I would like to fly in to India at the conclusion of the Europe trip and spend a couple weeks there in Mysore.
• jimmyjjohn

  

  i would like to travel to Germany or Netherlands or some other place
  and was wondering if i'll find fellow INFP's here willing to hang out with me.
  of coursefor anyone willing to i'd PM them and would want to get to know them better until then.
  i'm semi-new to this forum, been lurking on and off for years,
  will post in some other threads too for the sake of not being too mysterious unless procrastination forces shall rule over...
  I'm 25, an atheist, like riding bikes and hiking and with a slight penchant towards soft drugs if you're into that.
• sportchampps

  I went for 6 weeks. One place no one has mentioned was actually my favorite. Greece had amazing beaches and lil towns that were so much fun. It was like a party there each day after noon.
• TedSheckler

  

  jimmyjjohn;1622422 wrote: i would like to travel to Germany or Netherlands or some other place
  and was wondering if i'll find fellow INFP's here willing to hang out with me.
  of coursefor anyone willing to i'd PM them and would want to get to know them better until then.
  i'm semi-new to this forum, been lurking on and off for years,
  will post in some other threads too for the sake of not being too mysterious unless procrastination forces shall rule over...
  I'm 25, an atheist, like riding bikes and hiking and with a slight penchant towards soft drugs if you're into that.

  How interesting. Please tell me more.