Travel around Europe

So hard to find out what is the best way to get around europe - we are a family of five 2 A and 3 small kids - we fly from australia - couple days in london and think we will take eurostar to paris. We are in paris for nearly a week - but then want to go to switzerland and italy - including overnight Lausanne - Rome. We will also use the train to get to florence and venice.

At present the eurail passes are practically more expensive than our airfare from Australia.

Is the 3 city pass the best? Should we do something different ? Like DRIVE? Is there a cheap way to do it?

Is there any way to combine the london -= paris trip and get it a bit cheaper

If we buy the 3 country pass - if we take overnight is an additional charge and if so ( which i expect it is ) is it really expensive%26gt;?

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You have to figure out your trains journeys and then price them out on the national rail sites and compare that with the price of the passes you are looking at. Most of the time now the passes are not a bargain, especially since the long-distance trains require reservations, etc.

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Yes, the only way to know what%26#39;s most economical for your journeys is to calculate all the options. Then, price car rental options.

There are advantages and disadvantages to traveling by car. One huge advantage is not having to haul your bags on/off trains, but parking could be expensive/problematic and, of course, you have to find your way everywhere.

Have a look at www.seat61.com for plenty of information including the best way to book train travel at the best fares.

Rick Steves website also has lots of useful information about train travel.

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I think that the days of cheap train travel in Europe are long gone.. One has to pay for all these faster trains.. in other words you have to plan on seeing only 2 countries at most and not travel too much in each country.

Mind you, we travelled by train from Milan to Venice then Florence then back to Milan a few years ago and it wasn%26#39;t that expensive..and we bought tickets at the last minute as we travel standby by plane between continents and never know if/ when we will go to country A or B..as tentatively planed.

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%26gt;%26gt;%26gt;I think that the days of cheap train travel in Europe are long gone.%26lt;%26lt;%26lt;

I don%26#39;t think that is true at all. PREMs fares on French trains are an amazing bargain IMO and many countries have something similar. Even the famous £59 RT fare on Eurostar is pretty remarkable considering that it gets you from London to Paris in 2.25 hours. About a century ago (Well, OK it was only something over 40 years...) when I was living in London, my then GF and I flew to Paris for lunch one day on a lark. (Yes. I know. I%26#39;m just a crazy romantic fool...) There was some kind of special deal on the plane tickets. IIRC I paid almost £40 each for them. £59 looks dirt cheap 40 years later.

If you can make your plans and lock in your dates so you get the lowest fares I suspect that point-to-point tickets will work out cheaper in the long run. And yes, all your trains will require reservations for which you will have to pay and the overnight train will not be cheap.

Speaking of which, I wouldn%26#39;t take a night train from Lausanne to Rome. The route from Lausanne to Milan is one of the most magnificently scenic on any main line in Europe. It would be a shame to go through the Alps and past the Italian lakes in the dark. The Milan to Rome route isn%26#39;t as exciting, but parts of it are splendid too.

Buut it would make much more sense to travel from Lausanne to Milan and then to Venice, Florence and Rome in that order. Doing it in the order you suggest means a lot of back-tracking. Are you planning to fly into London and back from Rome? Or?

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I should have made it clear that when you buy P2P tickets on a train that requires a reservation, the fare includes the cost of the seat reservation.