Train tickets

I am looking for more information on purchasing regional rail tickets, most specifically the Bayern ticket. I have made several attempts to get bahn.de to display the price for the Bayern ticket but it just does not seem to happen. I have tried standard search and regional only with no luck. Can you purchase Bayern tickets on line for a group of 4? Should you buy tickets on-line from bahn.de or wait until arrival in Germany and buy at the local train station. Is it more cost effective to buy Eurail passes in advance, or buy individual tickets on-line or when you arrive in Germany?

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%26gt; I have made several attempts to get bahn.de to display the price for the Bayern ticket but it just does not seem to happen.

The Länder-Tickets (e.g. the Bavaria-Ticket) are offers by the German states (German: Länder), they are not shown as a price option in the DB timetable.

%26gt; Can you purchase Bayern tickets on line for a group of 4?

a) Yes - but only in German.

https:/…

Shipping is free.

b) There are two versions

Bavaria Ticket Single (1 person) EUR 18,00

Bavaria Ticket (2-5 persons) EUR 25,00

%26gt; Should you buy tickets on-line from bahn.de or wait until arrival in Germany and buy at the local train station.

Online makes only sense if you enter Bavaria on board of a train and want to use the Bavaria Ticket directly from the border (e.g. Frankfurt to Bavaria). Inside Bavaria you can buy the Bavaria Ticket from most ticket machines (same price like online).

If you buy at the counter there is an EUR 2,00 surcharge.

%26gt; Is it more cost effective to buy Eurail passes in advance, or buy individual tickets

on-line or when you arrive in Germany?

a) Eurail Pass: outside Europe

If you buy an Eurail Pass in Europe you have to pay a higher price (~ 15%). And the passes can be only bought at some of the big train stations. Some types are even not available if you buy in Europe at all.

b) individual tickets

As long these are normal tickets there is no price difference. There are however a number of special offers where you can get

- discounts if you buy in advance

- which are more expensive at the counter

- which are only available online

- seat reservations if bought online together with a ticket are EUR 1,50. Normally they are EUR 3,00.

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Just get the Bayern ticket at the train station when you arrive in Germany. There are automated machines in english where you can purchase them. It is very simple.

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To get a rough idea about a rail pass saving you $’s, you can use the Railsaver website. http://railsaver.com/railsaver.asp

Step 1: enter x and 35

check 1st or 2nd class

check “only if railpasses save me money”

Step 2: enter date, ? , Germany and number of nights

Step 3: enter your itinerary

Click on calculate and note the result

Click your Browser back to Step 1 and change to “if railpass provides best combination of...”, and note the result

Click your Browser back to Step 1 and change to “Always. I travel with...”, and note the result

You can then use to the DB website and find the exact train fares. http://reiseauskunft.bahn.de/bin/query.exe/en

The cost of a rail pass is at http://www.raileurope.com/us/index.htm

If you buy individual train tickets from any of the websites, you will pay as much as 25% more than you would at a train station.

Ultimately, it is your decision on how much you wish to spend or how much you wish to save !

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What city will you be in Bavaria - Munich?

For a first timer the ticket machines was a little confusing for me and might be for you. There are machines with English prompts (green faced,RMV), but I could not figure out how to get a %26quot;lander%26quot; ticket from them.

I got the group ticket from the grey-faced machines and they were in German only - at least the ones I saw.

If you push the %26quot;lander%26quot; button and select %26quot;gruppentageskarte bis 5 personen%26quot;, you will get the group Bayern ticket and save yourself 2 euros. If it%26#39;s too confusing, just go to the ticket window. Make sure you have exact change, some machines I encountered would only take exact change.

For whatever state in Germany you are in, as long as you select the %26quot;lander%26quot; option, the machine will print the %26quot;lander ticket%26quot; for that area. For example - for Munich it%26#39;s the Bayern and for Koblenz it the Rhineland-Pfalz.

Just wait until you get to Germany to buy your Bayern ticket as mentioned above.

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The 4 times we used a machine for buying a landers ticket they all took a credit card, so we didn%26#39;t need to worry about exact change. The engish directions we read were not difficult to follow, but the first time we did read carfully before we hit a button.