How do Eurorail passes work?

I am looking at spending a lot of time in Europe next summer, and am a little confused by Eurorail passes... Do you get a Eurorail pass and use it for the month that you paid for, and you can get on and off the train as you please and stay in hotels/hotels wherever you get off? Then just get on the train whenever you feel like leaving wherever you are and continue your trip?How do Eurorail passes work?
You can get Eurail passes for specific groups of countries and for certain lengths of time. The best resource is their website. Yes, you can travel as much as you want and when you want. It is best though to make your reservations early because some trains do fill up.
Yes, it is exactly as you thought.How do Eurorail passes work?
It gets more and more complicated as time goes one.



No, you can't just hop on and off like you used to. You have to reserve seats, and you have to pay surcharges on many routes, and you have to stand in line and go to the ticket counter to ask all the questions. If you DON'T pay the surcharge, you are likely to be put off the train at the next stop (can't just buy one from the conductor) and left high and dry in some podunk town that doesn't get regular service!



I believe you simply buy the pass, and start it when you get on the first train...no, you DO NOT use it when you buy it, as you have to buy it in the US, so, obviously, there is a bunch of time lag. But I don't think you would buy one today, and state that you are going to begin using it, say, July 1, or anything like that.



And IT VARIES ACCORDING TO WHICH TICKET YOU BUY AND THEY ARE SOOOOOOOO COMPLICATED!!!!



Go to raileurope.com or search eurail (It's spelled so many different ways that the websites are programmed to accept all misspellings!) and check them out.



I'm assuming you are a youngster (under 25, I think) so you want to check on the second class YOUTHPASS. Eliminate all the other stuff from the beginning. They are also available in different amounts of time...I think they are 2 week, 1 month, 2 month and 3 month.



I have heard that the concept of having a bunch of backpackers sitting on their luggage in the aisles, however, has been nixed. There were a number of trains where I had to do this...but nowadays, if you don't have a seat, you're out of luck.



Good luck!
Yes, a Eurail pass gives you access to the trains in Europe without worrying too much about the ticket price.



There are various passes, some are for all the countries (global passes), some are limited to countries that you select (select passes), some passes run over a certain amount of time (15 days to 3 months, these are the continous passes), others have a certain amount of travel days. And all are called Eurail passes.



Sounds complicated? Yeah, it is a little bit. It can be difficult to find the right Eurail pass, so take a long look at all the options at www.eurail.com.



BTW, www.eurail.com is the official site, buy from them, not anywhere else. Other sites like www.raileurope.com are nothing but travel agencies, there the price of your eurail pass also includes a handling fee that you have to pay.



Tip: The best deal for money is IMO the 3-months continous global pass. With this pass you pay approx. 11-14 EUR per day for unlimited rail travel. In most of western Europe that equals the price for 50-120 kms on the train. All the other passes have higher prices for a pass day. The 15-days in 2 months pass for example costs 35-53 EUR per travel day.



www.ricksteves.com/rail has a good guide for comparing the costs of railpasses against each other. Rick Steves makes a valid point in comparing Eurail passes against point-to-point tickets, unfortunately he only compares normal train prices against the price of the eurail pass. (For some reason he forgets about special offers for train tickets as well as bus and airplane as alternatives.)



Have fun!