ticket booking
The Best Booking Sites for Train Tickets for Spain — Reviewed
In our search for the cheapest tickets and easiest booking, we’ve reviewed all of the options for buying train tickets for Spain. We looked at the official Renfe site and compared it to a number of private portals. While Spanish trains in general are a pleasure to ride, Renfe’s own official website is full of …
How to Get the Best Child and Youth Discounts on European Trains
The value proposition for travelling by train in Europe grows by multiples when it comes to travelling with children. Compared to flying, train operators are quite generous in the age brackets for free travel with babies and toddlers and they offer significant discounts for youth. Also, trains are quite a bit more comfortable, often have …
Our Test Results: The Best Train Booking Platform for Europe
We performed hundreds of searches for train tickets on the websites of national European train companies as well as private portals. The goal: determine the cheapest and best way to buy tickets for riding the rails in Europe. We’ve been riding around Europe ourselves for a few combined decades and plan to continue to do so …
The Cheaper Tricks for Booking Europe Train Tickets from Australia
If you’re Australian and looking to book train tickets for a jaunt through Europe, there’s a good chance you’ll wind up redirected to more expensive booking sites like Rail Europe (formerly Rail Plus). Or you’ll attempt to buy tickets from SNCF Connect but hit website errors, from Trenitalia but not understand the Italians’ quasi-English, from …
RailEurope vs Trainline: Which Train Booking Platform Is Best for Europe?
We ran dozens of pan-Europe searches on our two favorite train booking platforms, RailEurope (formerly Loco2) and Trainline, and compared the results. The goal: determine which booking experience is smoother and results in better and cheaper routes. We have found that both of these platforms are better than booking directly from mainland Europe’s national train companies. …
Solved! The Problems with SNCF Connect and Ouigo Websites — and How We Buy French Train Tickets in Spite of Them
If you are blocked by error messages on the SNCF Connect or on Ouigo.com, you’re not alone. The websites and apps have lots of redirects and undergo constant updates that can render them in some cases nearly unusable. In particular, the transition to the new SNCF Connect website has been very rough and disabled a number …
Solutions for Buying Train Tickets for France in Spite of Credit Card Rejections from Ouigo and SNCF Connect
The French train operator’s websites SNCF Connect and Ouigo are notorious for rejecting bank and credit cards from outside of France. Those from Brazil, Eastern Europe, the United States, Australia, and Canada in particular report problems with payments not going through or getting rejected. We’ve been carefully researching the best alternatives for foreigners looking to purchase …
How to Travel Europe by Train
We’ve been travelling all around Europe by train for two decades now, and we’ve got more than a few dos and don’ts to have a cheap, comfortable, and lovely time rolling across the continent. We’ll go through how to best book train tickets from outside (or inside) Europe, what to take on board, and how …
Here’s How We Solved the Problems with Booking On Trenitalia’s Website
I’ve been booking trains in Italy for many years, and oh, the problems. Trenitalia’s official website is buggy to say the least, and the ticket machines in train stations are as confusing as the humans at the ticket counters. Worse, using foreign (American, French, etc.) credit cards can cause even more headaches. Italians have these problems …
Reviewed: The Cheapest, Easiest Ways to Book Italian Train Tickets
We’ve spent weeks testing websites to find out how to efficiently book the cheapest tickets for Italian train travel. We tested all kinds of routes and options, and looked at overall end purchase prices as well as the complaints about and defects with the national operator’s website, Trenitalia and to the competing private train operator, …