Train prices in Summer

zagmund

Slightly vague question here, but bear with me . . . it's January and thoughts naturally turn to fantasy holiday planning at this time of year. I've looked at going overland from my house to somewhere far, far away by train & boat. So far, picking dates in April & May (as far ahead as you can book at the moment), it's possible to get from Dublin to Munich for between €115 & €150 a head for a family of 4 (depending on couchette/sleeper choice). This includes Eurostar from London to Paris & the sleeper fare from Paris to Munich. All in all, not a bad deal.

However, these are not Summer fares. I know that at certain peak times in Summer fares will be much harder to get and will sell out quickly. Before I start planning too much does anyone know whether these sorts of fares are available year round from Deutsche Bahn?

And, no, I wouldn't be dragging the entire family from Dublin to Germany in 32 hours of end to end train joy. We would spend a few days in London, a few days in Paris, a few days in Munich and then fly home from there. That's the theory anyway.

So, do DB saver fares either disappear or get more expensive in Summer, or can I hope to get these in June or July too?

z

schemingbohemia

Hadn't realised you could use those fares to get to Paris as well, that's great value. Actually having read the link below, whilst it states London-Paris the terms and conditions say Brussels only, might be worth checking out further.

http://www.bahn.de/i/view/GBR/en/prices/europe/london-cologne-special.shtml

I think because it's also using eurostar I think the numbers per train are limited, so getting a whole family on might be tricky.

Your best bet would be have a good look around www.seat61.com for more info.

keithclancy

City Night Line prices in the holiday periods can range from 180 - 250 euros per person for a couchette from Amsterdam - Munich.

Thats a good deal though ... might look into a night in Munich meself

munchkin_utd

i can beat that!
118 Euro one way from London to Munich with an (EDIT: 2) overnights in Brussels for a family of 2 adults and 2 kids !

Your travel data
Details
Tu, 05.03.2013, 19:34
London S Pancras Int - München Hbf

Your selectionDetails
Ticket 118,00 EUR

Single journey, all passengers
Total price 118,00 EUR

On german railways stopovers can be included in a journey for free and the website allows for such to be specified.
Kids are Free normally so that deal is 2*59euro adult price and 2 under 16s for free.
Another condition of the deal is "Cross-border routes between Germany and the UK via Brussels only", hence the night in Brussels rather than Paris.
Still, you could goto Bruges maybe instead which is supposed to be lovely? (hint, the german system probably cannot route you via Bruges so you'd need to have your stopover specified as Brüssel midi but just buy the ticket for the local train to Bruges in Belgium when youre there)

Also, you could maybe specify another (free!) stopover somewhere nice in Germany to break the journey again?
Somewhere like Heidelberg springs to mind but theres plenty of nice (and shabby industrial) places there in mid Germany.

Regarding availability. If you can avoid weekends then deals are much easier to come across. In summer you have more tourist traffic but far less business travellers which means that the railways (and many nice hotels) arent as full as you would think.

EDIT: to help planning, you can book about 3 months in advance, i.e. : "At the earliest 92 days and at the latest 3 days before the date of travel" so it wouldnt be all that last minute and if you are on the button when the tickets become available you'd have a very good chance of getting what you want.