Interrail 2011

YouthNovel

Hey

I'm planning on going interrailing with a mate of mine this July.

Our routes looking a little like this;

Paris - Amsterdam - Hamburg - Berlin - Warsaw - Kraków - Budapest - Vienna - Venice - Milan - Florence - Rome

We're going for the month, spending 2/3 days in each city and getting as many night trains as possible.

Couple of questions I was hoping someone with a bit of experience could answer for me. Would be great help

-Is it a good idea to book accom before heading, or maybe just a few days before we head?

-Is the route a good one, or would you recommend changes?

-How much money should be brought?

-Are there extra charges for travelling at night, and is it worth it?

-Are there any tips you can offer for some interrailing virgins?

Zonda999

YouthNovel wrote: »

Hey

I'm planning on going interrailing with a mate of mine this July.

Our routes looking a little like this;

Paris - Amsterdam - Hamburg - Berlin - Warsaw - Kraków - Budapest - Vienna - Venice - Milan - Florence - Rome

We're going for the month, spending 2/3 days in each city and getting as many night trains as possible.

Couple of questions I was hoping someone with a bit of experience could answer for me. Would be great help

-Is it a good idea to book accom before heading, or maybe just a few days before we head?

-Is the route a good one, or would you recommend changes?

-How much money should be brought?

-Are there extra charges for travelling at night, and is it worth it?

-Are there any tips you can offer for some interrailing virgins?

Went interailing last year and for the booking accomodation thing, what we did was book our hostels a few days ahead, as in we'd book accomodation for the next city we'd be heading to only, worked out fine. We found we'd be just too restricted for the whole trip if we booked the entire thing ahead

As for night travel, ussualy there'd only be extra charges if you actually wanted a lseeper car, if you were willing to put up with a seat for the night, i dont think thered be any extra charge. For as little as it was, itd fully recommend going for the 6 bed couchette option

Your route looks good, although you do realuise that quite a few of those cities would be considered "expensive" really. When i went, we stayed a bit more out east than that and it we found it mush cheaper than german cities, for example. If you can afford it though rock on!

As for the money, we did 3 weeks and it worked out about 1600 incl flights, doin it any cheaper, thered have been little rom for an y creature comforts we though. That gave about 50$ a day spending, accomodation came outta that though!

Civilian_Target

Yeah, a good plan for 4 or 5 weeks, and a good selection of cities (except maybe Warsaw?), should be good. I'd budget 2,000 all in if you don't want to be thinking about every price... although it can be done for about 1,200.

Don't book accommodation before you go, your route can and should change, depending on who you meet, and what you want to do. You can get too high in Amsterdam, too hedonistic in Berlin, fall in love with Vienna or meet a girl in Krakow, and end up staying a week. Part of the point of interrailing is to not plan, and even to have a good stay somewhere that means passing on a few cities.

Usually couchettes are extra on night trains - I'd highly recommend it for the Vienna - Venice leg. Otherwise, I wouldn't bother, and dare I suggest, don't get night trains for Amsterdam - Hamburg - Berlin... they're real night cities... you'll need the daytime to recover

billyhead

Hi All,

I would be interested in doing this for the month of Augst. The budget would not be an issue. I was just wondering would you have to start arranging the trip this early and if so what would I need to organise. Would i need to book the rail and airline tickets now?

YouthNovel

Civilian_Target wrote: »

Yeah, a good plan for 4 or 5 weeks, and a good selection of cities (except maybe Warsaw?), should be good. I'd budget 2,000 all in if you don't want to be thinking about every price... although it can be done for about 1,200.

Did you include the travel costs in that? I hope so!

I'm looking at keeping this as cheap as possible, but still being able to keep comfortable (ie getting the couchettes and eat simple healthy stuff)

I'm looking at doing more of the touristy things and exploring quieter parts of the city as opposed to adventure trips or cycling trips. Do you think this would save on money?

BDW what kinda food can you bring on a plane? I'm talking soups (packet) and other small easy cheap things?

Civilian_Target

YouthNovel wrote: »

Did you include the travel costs in that? I hope so!

I'm looking at keeping this as cheap as possible, but still being able to keep comfortable (ie getting the couchettes and eat simple healthy stuff)

I'm looking at doing more of the touristy things and exploring quieter parts of the city as opposed to adventure trips or cycling trips. Do you think this would save on money?

BDW what kinda food can you bring on a plane? I'm talking soups (packet) and other small easy cheap things?

Yeah, that's all in, including the flights. I'm assuming the not healthy route: you eat at cheap food joints every night, and fairly liberal drinking. If you cook for yourself, pick cheap hostels and stay sober (or stick to tins at the hostel), you could do it for half that. You can take any food except unprocessed meat and dairy products in your checked baggage.. so soup is fine. But do you really want to carry soup around Europe with you?! (They do have supermarkets in other countries too you know!)

If you're organising well in advance, a few couchsurfing checkpoints will also keep the cost down. In particular, Vienna and Berlin are huge couchsurfing cities.

Finally, one place I would advise pre-booking your hostel is Venice, or you might end up sleeping in the bottom of a gondola

Civilian_Target

billyhead wrote: »

Hi All,

I would be interested in doing this for the month of Augst. The budget would not be an issue. I was just wondering would you have to start arranging the trip this early and if so what would I need to organise. Would i need to book the rail and airline tickets now?

Personally, I would say book the airline tickets now, and leave the rest until later.

Depending on what your route and travel speed is, it might be useful to buy an interrail pass, which you should also do at least a few weeks before you leave. Unless there's 10 of you, booking hostels is usually easy enough to do a couple of days in advance.

justcallmemoses

Hoping to go inter-railing for the 1st time in early September. We plan to take in Amsterdam, Berlin, Krakow, Prague, Bratislava, Budapest, Ljubljana and fly home from Zadar.

Is this a realistic aim in three weeks??????

munchkin_utd

YouthNovel wrote: »

BDW what kinda food can you bring on a plane? I'm talking soups (packet) and other small easy cheap things?

theres plenty of cheap stuff on the continent too.
A bag of pasta is only 40c in Aldi for instance. And that'll do 3 or 4 dinners.
Throw cheapo pesto on it and you have a filling dinner for less than 50c.

And if you are staying in a place for a couple of days, just get in some frozen asian mixed vegatables. A 2 euro pack will do a healthy dinner for a few days in a row.

and even take out. In Berlin a greasy kebab has squillions of calories, and come vitamins and is only €2. Or get a feck off massive wurst for the same price. And in croatia they have cecapaci which is like little burger sticks in a freshly baked roll. Not to mention turkish style cheezy pastries that'll fill ya for next to nothing.

BTW: would you really want soup and it 35degrees?

fakearms123

Hey

I'm planning on going interrailing with a mate of mine this July.

Our routes looking a little like this;

Paris - Amsterdam - Hamburg - Berlin - Warsaw - Kraków - Budapest - Vienna - Venice - Milan - Florence - Rome

We're going for the month, spending 2/3 days in each city and getting as many night trains as possible.

Couple of questions I was hoping someone with a bit of experience could answer for me. Would be great help

-Is it a good idea to book accom before heading, or maybe just a few days before we head? I would advise booking maybe a day or two in advance, simply because it is cheaper but you also want flexiblity in your trip in case you want to stay in a certain city a little longer or maybe for some reason want to leave a certain place quicker :P, it can happen for example me and my friend did this trip 2 years ago and hated Prague so we left early but we loved Croatia so we stayed almost a week there. I would recommend you book your hostels through http://www.hostelworld.com, its an absolute gem of a website for booking last minute rooms.

-Is the route a good one, or would you recommend changes? Your route is okay, I mean I personally would avoid Milan, not much there really for a "interrailer", its an expensive city. I would definitely swap Hamburg for Munich as well, Munich was one of the best cities on our trip. Your route is very very expensive, especially Paris, Rome and Milan but I like that you have included Poland in your trip. If I could make one suggestion I would recommend Croatia (Zagreb, Split and Dubrovnik) it is an absolutely beautful country and warm and cheap. It was the highlight of the trip, especially Dubrovnik. You can get a ferry from Dubrovnik across to Bari and then get the train straight up to Rome, then onto Florence, then Munich then Paris if you wanted to. I never got to do it but I always wanted to stop off in Lake Bled in Slovenia, everyone we met said to go there. If I had to change your route this is the route I'd advise
Amsterdam - Berlin - Kraków - Vienna (maybe) - Budapest - Zagreb, Split, Dubrovnik (ferry) - Rome - Florence - Venice(maybe) - Munich - Paris
I have two maybes for your trip because you might be stuck for time with all these cities on your list so I would advise you should probably leave both out if you are spending a long time in each of the other cities or add one if you have the time.

-How much money should be brought? I would imagine about 2 grand seeing as though its your first time interrailling but if your smart about things and maybe investigate into finding cheap places to eat and stay in large dorms then you will bring your spending money down a huge amount, the main places that will rip into your budget are Italy and Paris. You should probably pick up a lonely planet book (like Europe on a shoestring) or what we did was pick up a map when we arrived and then hit an internet cafe more info. Use your wits and you will be able to stick to a good budget on your trip but make sure it doesnt stop you from doing what you want to do.

-Are there extra charges for travelling at night, and is it worth it? There's only extra charges if you decide to sleep in a bed on the train, you ticket will only cover you for the economy classes so if you are really tired and cant sleep sitting in economy (which we had to do but I am an incredible heavy sleeper, something that my friend hated about me ) then you could buy a bed on the train for the night. Make sure you check the train timetable to see if there is in fact an overnight train between your destinations. The train timetable wesite we used and swore to was this http://www.oebb.at/en/index.jsp

-Are there any tips you can offer for some interrailing virgins? Have fun, talk to people in your hostel, make new friends. Me and my friend went out to karaoke and a cool bar with a Spannish guy, Japanese guy, French Canadian guy, Mexican Canadian girl, Argentine girl, German guy and Colombian guy in Budapest, it was one of the funniest weirdest nights out I think I have ever had! I got a massive bear hug off a Hungarian bodybuilder who was only 17 years old, he was massive! His nickname was Baby cause he had a face like a baby. You will have so many memories, I would be envious of you but I am going to southeast asia for 2 months this summer! Enjoy! Best of luck!

Konata

I went interrailing in Summer 2009 for a month. Overall it cost me about 1300 - 1500 incl. interrail ticket, flights, accom, etc. etc.

Accomodation wise, we booked the first place we were staying in (Budapest) before we left and the next (Krakow). After that we generally just booked as we went along e.g. maybe 2 days before we left each destination. Worked out pretty well cause we found we deviated slightly from our original plan along the way. For example, we didn't really like Prague so only stayed there 2 nights (instead of the original 4) and picked a random German city on the way to Berlin and stayed there for the extra 2 nights. That city turned out to be Dresden and we had an awesome time there.

Your route looks grand. I'd advise leaving out Warsaw though. We went to Krakow and everyone we met - Polish and foreigners - advised against going to Warsaw. They said it's a dreary city and not great for travelers. Krakow is the place to see in Poland and you'll have seen enough there. In fact, it turned out to be our favourite city!

Bear in mind that the further north you go, the more expensive it gets. We started off in Budapest, Krakow, Prague... and we "splurged" there ie. we ate out for dinner, bought lots of alcohol etc. This was because a dinner cost about 4-5 euro in a restaurant and a litre of vodka was about 5-6 euro :P When we got to Berlin, Amsterdam etc. we lived on supermarket food and toned down the drinking etc.

Civilian_Target

justcallmemoses wrote: »

Hoping to go inter-railing for the 1st time in early September. We plan to take in Amsterdam, Berlin, Krakow, Prague, Bratislava, Budapest, Ljubljana and fly home from Zadar.

Is this a realistic aim in three weeks??????

Yeah, skip Bratislava... Vienna's much better. (Or Dubrovnik, or Dresden or Bled in Slovenia...)

pontalpha

I would advise anyone who goes interrailing to go to Bled in Slovenia.

Dubrovnik is also brilliant and what we did a few years back was worked our way through Eastern Europe, down to Dubrovnik (have to get a bus from Split), then got a ferry from Dubrovnik over to Italy.

Also agree on Munich over Hamburg.

gudfela

alri
me and 2 of my mates are goin this interrailing this summer our route is lookin like
paris - zurich - munich - budapiest - krakow - prague - berlin - brussels - amsterdam

we are lookin for more a partying/clubbing holiday than just sight seeing.
wondering does any1 av tips for any good clubs or things to do in these places, also cheap hostels/restaurants.
sound

lcurran1

the best way to do the clubbing part of interrailing is to do the pub crawls, theyre not that expensive and they bring you to the best clubs instead of you wandering around looking for them. also if theres only a few of your mates going its a good way to meet people.

Civilian_Target

Zurich is seriously expensive for clubbing, and a bit off your route.... I'd skip it. In France, Paris is dead in July and August... clubbing heads south to the coasts. Same, in Belgium, skip Brussels for parties, try Leuven (Louvain in French) instead - there's also a good rave scene there in summer, they call them 'frees' or 'free party'

Krakow, Berlin, Prague and the Dam are all solid choices. For something a bit different (and cheaper), consider ex-Yugoslavia and Romania - they know how to party round there. Ljubljana, Belgrade and Timisoara are all great.

WilcoOut

pontalpha wrote: »

I would advise anyone who goes interrailing to go to Bled in Slovenia.

Dubrovnik is also brilliant and what we did a few years back was worked our way through Eastern Europe, down to Dubrovnik (have to get a bus from Split), then got a ferry from Dubrovnik over to Italy.

Also agree on Munich over Hamburg.

100% agree with this, Bled is a MUST SEE!

what a perfect place

Munich is amazing aswell, and hit Split and Hvar in Croatia for a great slice a culture, the best lookin women in Europe and a good booze up

with regards to accomodation, try book your next city when you arrive in your first and keep it going from there. be one step ahead, its nice to have thing in order

we got the short end of the stick last year when we had a mix up with accom in berlin. we were almost homeless due to the high demand during the world cup semi's. a very well learned lesson!

citizen_p

YouthNovel wrote: »

Couple of questions I was hoping someone with a bit of experience could answer for me. Would be great help

-Is it a good idea to book accom before heading, or maybe just a few days before we head?

not really but to get a general Idea of good hostels and where they are located in each city, try hostelworld.com , its Irish run so youll also get 2 euro off the service charge just from being from Ireland.

a person i know who went got great use from it, and each hostel has ratings and details of what they have in them.

(I assume you were looing for hostels and not the four seasons in each country)

munchkin_utd

Civilian_Target wrote: »

Zurich is seriously expensive for clubbing, and a bit off your route.... I'd skip it. In France, Paris is dead in July and August... clubbing heads south to the coasts. Same, in Belgium, skip Brussels for parties, try Leuven (Louvain in French) instead - there's also a good rave scene there in summer, they call them 'frees' or 'free party'

Krakow, Berlin, Prague and the Dam are all solid choices. For something a bit different (and cheaper), consider ex-Yugoslavia and Romania - they know how to party round there. Ljubljana, Belgrade and Timisoara are all great.

very sound advice there!

- Zurich is (from what Ive heard) one of the most boring places you can imagine. Not party zone central! And bloody dear!
- Ex yugoslavia is a good tip, Belgrade especially. Its a very young city, the people arent rich, so they live for the party!! Its just hoppin at the weekend!! (and the wimmin! Christ. )

the only thing you could add might be Hamburg or Cologne. Hamburg for the crazy reeperbahn area. Cologne cos its the home of german dance music and lots and lots of clubs.

will also endorse (the irish company) Hostelworld!
Have booked places from Budapest to Barcelona and its 100%.
Probably the best hostel booking site out there

Civilian_Target

I'd second that recommendation for Hamburg actually - good spot that one.

dory

+1 for ex-Yugoslavia. I just spent the last week in Macedonia - amazing country! I'm more into nature than clubbing but those who went clubbing said it was great. And our local bar in Struga was called Tullamore! Not even an Irish pub.

Civilian_Target

Interestingly, Sláinte in Macedonian means "Little Elephant"...

dory

Slán is elephant in all (AFAIK) Slavic languages. It's what I tell them to think of when I'm teaching them cúpla focal!

Also uaireadóir (watch) is orë dore (pronounced the same) in Albanian!

Civilian_Target

sure - but I didn't think 'te was diminuitive in most of them....

revz

If anyone that has a good knowledge of how interrailing works could take a glance over my plans and see if it's plausible i'd be very grateful!

Me and my friends are planning on going in August, and getting the "10 days travel in 22 days" ticket. Our route is Amsterdam - Berlin - Krakow - Prague - Budapest - Belgrade - Sarajevo - Zagreb - Ljubjana + Lake Bled - Venice (Only going to Venice for the flights home really)
We plan on spending 3 days in Amsterdam, and then setting off, would we be able to visit that many cities in 25 days total? If not I think we agreed we'd cut out Sarajevo.
Should Krakow & Prague be the other way round in the order we see them? Or does it not make that much of a difference?

If anyone sees any flaws please let me know.
Cheers!

Civilian_Target

Wouldn't bother getting the 10 days in 22 ticket for this journey - if you buy Amsterdam - Berlin in advance, you'll get the tickets cheaper at the local stations....

I think you'll probably need to drop 1 city off the list, Sarajevo is a bit out of the way, (Belgrade and Sarajevo will add a big long loop to your journey) but I'd be more inclined to drop Zagreb... it's less interesting.

If you haven't booked your flights yet, consider flying out of Vienna instead, it's less touristy than Venice, and with more depth. If you have booked your flights, then book your hostel in Venice too, hostels are hard to get there, you could end up sleeping in a gondola!

AdrianII

Hi all, thinking of doing this ourselfs. Dont have a route yet, but due to the cheap flights on the aerlingus sale, we are flying into berlin and leaving from barcelona. Any body got any idea's of the cities to take in.

we are going for 14 days and plan to have 1 or 2 days per location then get a night train or some thing like that.

From google maps the route looks like berlin, nuremburg, munich, zurich, milan, monaco and barcelona.

or an alt route could be

berlin - prague - vienna - munich - zurich - monaco - barcelona

(we can skip munich, as been there before, but its a great spot all the same)

Not sure if this is possible

anybody got experience about this, were both 28ish so the student rate is gone, is the 1st class rate any use, do the trains have beds??
Im presume id need a traveller back pack as a suitcase would look stupid.

Sorry if these sound like stupid questions

Civilian_Target

That's a tight schedule - you kinda need to drop a city out of that. Personally, I'd let Monaco go, unless you have a good reason to got there. Monaco - Barca is slow, and Zurich - Monaco is slow too. Better to check out Lyon / Marseilles / Monpellier / Toulouse, since they're on your way

AdrianII

thanks for that

how about beds on the train. Are there any. Are they expensive.

Civilian_Target

Which train we talking about here? I'm not sure that the Train Hotel from Monaco to Barca still runs... in any case I'd be pretty sure it's not going to be covered by the interrail pass

culline

Well lads, some great reading in there for people who haven't travelled europe yet, thanks for the advice.

Looking to start off interrail at Benicassim and end in Croatia. Going for 5 weeks approx, budget is about 2000 but can push it a bit higher if needed.

Route looks like this-

Dublin-> Barcelona(Benicassim)-> Paris-> Amstersdam-> Berlin-> Prague-> Bratislava-> Budapest-> Zagreb-> Ljubljana-> Croatia(not sure of final destaination).

Can anyone offer advice on the route itself, cities maybe that Im missing or should avoid. Is timespan and budget ok? Any suggestion of final destination!? My girlfriend wants to go to a beach in Croatia to end it, anyone agree/disagree!?

Thanks again

keenan110

Looks like there are some great trips going to happen this summer!:)

I'm interrailing for a month, this is my route:
Paris-Lyon-Milan-Split-Dubrovnik-Ljubljana-Vienna-prague-Krakow.

Spending on average 3 days in each city.

Have already booked the flights and all the hostels, i like to have things organised!!:o

RoyalMarine

thinking about doing this in the summer, do you really need to fly to europe or would it be cheaper to go on the ferry?

i see the month interrail pass is 409 for under 25's and 619 for over 25's...

im 26, but most of my mates are under 25. thats a bit harsh aint it?

any way around that? i got the prices from http://www.interrailnet.com/interrail-passes/interrail-global-pass.

is there better places to buy from, or would it be cheaper to buy the tickets as we go, train to train etc.

Civilian_Target

Unless you're doing mostly western and northern Europe (France, Germany, Austria Switzerland, Belgium, Holland, Scandanavia), I'd recommend you just don't bother with a pass. Unless you're travelling every day, it's generally just cheaper and easier to buy the tickets as you go.

dforde

me an six of my mates are heading interrailing on the 14th of july we bought the 10 in 22 days package!
do you think our route is possible and if so how much would be needed?

Amsterdam 3 nights - Berlin 3/4 nights - Prague 3/4 nights
Krakow 3/4 nights - Bratislava 3 nights Ljubljana/Lake Bled 3 nights - Barcelona 4/5 nights

Civilian_Target

You won't get 3 days out of Bratislava to be honest. Also, Slovenia -> Barcelona's an enormous journey - it's 9 hours from Slovenia to Nice, and another 9 to do Nice Barcelona. Amsterdam - Berlin is also a long journey. I'd say drop Barca and hit somewhere else instead - either add some german cities in the middle, or some serbia / croatia at the end. And I'd recommend Vienna over Bratislava any day!

WilcoOut

Civilian_Target wrote: »

You won't get 3 days out of Bratislava to be honest. Also, Slovenia -> Barcelona's an enormous journey - it's 9 hours from Slovenia to Nice, and another 9 to do Nice Barcelona. Amsterdam - Berlin is also a long journey. I'd say drop Barca and hit somewhere else instead - either add some german cities in the middle, or some serbia / croatia at the end. And I'd recommend Vienna over Bratislava any day!

yeah bratislava wasnt the best spot iv ever been to

pub crawl was savage tho

Vienna is not to be missed! stay in lake bled for more tim eif you can, its heaven or more time in Split in croatia. i wouldnt waste my time jamming major cities in and having to travel mental journeys to get there

but i understand you want to get alot in

personally, id keep it compact. i learned this last year. short bursts of journeys are the way forward

T-rev

Had a good interrail trip planned for loads of western cities but now we are going to spend about two weeks in Eastern Europe. Anyone reccommend any good cities in Eastern Europe. Prague, Krakow, Bucharest and Budapest are the ones we have picked so far.

Civilian_Target

Check out Lviv in Ukraine. It's a bit off the beaten track, but it's worth it - much prettier than Krakow (with a cool Soviet Russia feel, they still have statues of Lenin), cheap, and a buzzing nightlife!

UnPetiteAmie

Me and my friend are going interrailing for the month of July. We have a 22 day ticket and our route is gonna be something like Paris- Amsterdam- Poland- Prague- Slovenia- Slovakia- Croatia and then we're gonna stay in Hvar for six days at the end. Is it safe for two girls to be going on their own? And any advice about the places we chose?

Funny_Bones

Hi,

Myself and my friend(2 girls) are planning to go from Karakow to Dubrovnik in about 25 days. We want to go to the main cities(Prague, Budapest, Bratislava, Vienna). We have kept our journey relatively short as we would like to see the some more of each country.. (Lake Bled and maybe the Soca Valley). Are there other 'off the beaten track' locations anyone could recommend?? While we want to see the main cities, we are very interested in some natural beauty as well :-)

For the places I've mentioned.. would you recommend buying an interrailing pass or would it be better just to pay as you go? If we plan to some countryside locations would we getting buses so maybe a 10 day train pass in 22 days be more value than just buying a full pass?

To Unpetiteamie, as I said already we are 2 girls travelling as well. aged 25 and 26. I imagine it should be safe enough. A lot of people do this alone and have no problem. Ideally we would have liked a couple of more people to go with but due to work/lack of work/ and other summer plans it only suits for us two to go. I'm sure as long as you don't get too drunk and use common sense it would be safe enough(I hope:))
Thanks

seafood dunleavy

Has anyone done interrailing and camped somewhere instead of staying in hostels? And were there decent places to camp in most of the big cities? Probably stay in a hostel some nights but trying to cut costs where ever possible!

rob w

Hi,

Im planning on interrailling in july, have 16 days free and planning on leaving on the first of july!! I was just wondering if anyone had any advice on my route, if its realistic enough to do in that time!

Krakow (4 days) --- Budapest OR Vienna(3 days) --- Ljubljana(1 day) --- Bled(3/4 days) --- Zagreb(2 days) --- Zadar(2 days).

So thats my plan, really looking forward to it. But if anyone has advice or recomendations, cant decide between budapest or vienna, please let me know!!

Thanks in advance:)

investment

Dangerous to travel with this bug going around

Civilian_Target

investment wrote: »

Dangerous to travel with this bug going around

lol! You've a much better chance of being hit by a car

Civilian_Target

rob w wrote: »

So thats my plan, really looking forward to it. But if anyone has advice or recomendations, cant decide between budapest or vienna, please let me know!!

Thanks in advance:)

Only done stopover in Budapest so I can't really help you decide, but Vienna's great. Lots to see, lots to do, people are friendly and know how to party. Not cheap though.

Stevielad

Going interrailing for the month of july then ending up in napa for the first week in August.

Trip: Amsterdam > Berlin > Prague > Vienna > Budapest > Lake Bled > Pag > Dubrovnik > Split (to fly from Split to Ayia Napa)

Has anyone advice on whether this is a recommended trip? Things to do along the way? Changes to be made? Where is expensive? We might have accommodation set up in Prague and Budapest, provided friends are still there by the time we arrive. Advice on getting around Croatia as train stations are pretty much non existent along the coast?

el oh el

Has anyone here interrailed on the eastern balkan (bulgaria/romania/serbia) before? We're planning on sticking to a lower budget so our 2 week trip will more or less look like this:

Vienna - (Budapest) - Bucharest - Varna - Sofia - Belgrade - Zagreb - Zadar - Split

We went to budapest on a weekend break last year so probably won't stay there... The plan was to get to the beach twice, thus Varna and Split are on the list. Any recommendations or "must dos"?
Will be my first time interrailing by the way

rob w wrote: »

cant decide between budapest or vienna, please let me know!!

Both have their advantages and disadvantages, I'd take vienna for the nightlife and budapest for the sights. What many people dont realise is that vienna has one of the largest night scenes in europe, the thing is that the city only promotes the cultural side as they dont want stag weekends etc to take place there. It is one of the few cities in the world where the metro runs all night on weekends to accommodate for party-goers and there are clubs for all tastes/likes. Starting point for any backpacker on a night out in vienna would be The Travel Shack (cheap beer and shots http://www.travelshackvienna.com/).

Civilian_Target

Sofia to Belgrade's a long haul. Stop off in Skopje on the way

el oh el

was thinking of taking a night train for that one though... Would it maybe be smarter to take a bus from Bucharest to Varna as its only 260 kms and the train takes 8 hours?

pasco

Has anyone been to Lake Balaton in Hungary? It seems quite big and just wondering if anyones knows which part is the best or any accomodation to recommend? There also seems to be a festival there, anyone been?

or anyone been to Lent festival in Slovenia, it kind of seems to be a local cultural festival from the website....is it more for older people or worth a trip if your in the area?