Eurail Pass Explained: Everything You Need to Know | PLUS TIPS

what is URL how do urail passes work what is the difference between neural Rail and interrail what are those pesky reservation fees all about in this video we have the answers to all your questions plus we'll talk about some big changes that URL has made recently so let's get started alright Travelers Stephen here from ginger on the go and we are back with another video on how to travel Europe by now you already know that this week we were talking about one of the most popular ways to get around Europe and that is your rail we'll get to that in just one second I promise but first I want to give a huge shout out to everybody that has followed the channel we've just reached 1 000 subscribers which happened way faster than I thought especially at the rate I've been putting out videos so I just wanted to say thank you it means a lot that you guys are enjoying the content and it inspires me to keep making more it's really great to see a community forming which was the whole idea behind this so I appreciate it a lot and it's always fun to read what you guys have to say but let's get back to your rail now when it comes to your rail I don't want to brag but I'm a little bit of an expert I've had six or seven URL passes throughout my life I just had a three month Global pass that ended last month and actually tomorrow morning I'm on a train from Sweden all the way down to Rome and guess how I'm getting there I mean we all know the answer is your rail right so when it comes to URL I know what I'm talking about and by the end of this video so will you plus I'll share some of my super secret inside tips that help you get the most out of your your Rail Pass and one final last thing before we really break down your rail this channel has helped you at all master travel then help us Master the YouTube algorithm by Smashing that like button smash it we greatly appreciate it first things first what is your rail well at its most basic URL is a company that sells passes that let you travel around Europe and the biggest selling point of these passes is that they give you freedom freedom to change your trip at a moment's notice freedom to hop on a different train if you hit the snooze button one too many times and missed your original one freedom take a lot of small detours while you are on your way to your main destination and these are options you wouldn't have if you're flying or if you just bought a regular train ticket your rail is all about freedom and another big selling point of view rail is that it is a set price although this price is not always what it seems but we'll talk more about that later and your rail offers a variety of passes you can get a single country pass meaning it's only valid for one country or the global pass which is valid for 30 countries your rail also used to have a multi-country pass which means you could combine countries like Italy and France and Switzerland but recently they have gotten rid of them and instead replaced them with your rail packages now these are set itineraries throughout Europe like Paris to Bruges and then to Amsterdam now these are brand new and I haven't had any experience with them so I can't judge but looking at them I'm not a fan because it strips away some of that sweet sweet freedom I was talking about earlier another good thing about your rail passes is that you can customize them for around the number of days you are traveling one point where Travelers have a little bit of confusion is between your Rail and interrail and it's easy to see why these passes look almost identical except that interrail is a little bit cheaper so what is the difference and which one can you get well the answer is actually really simple interrail is for EU residents only while your rail is for everyone else even me someone who lives in Europe I have a residency Visa here but I'm not a citizen yet I have to get a URL pass not an interrail pass which sucks because like I said interrail is a little bit cheaper okay how do URL passes work well I briefly talked about what kind of passes they are but now let's really break it down and see how they work so you can pick the right pass for you the first thing you'll notice when you go to buy a pass is that if you want to get a single country pass or the global pass you also have those URL packages but we're not dealing with those today and after you click on the type of pass you want you'll notice that you get a bunch of options for the amount of time that you need it URL passes come in blocks of time so for example let's stick with Italy I have Italy on the brain so for Italy you could get a three five or seven day pass this means you have three five or seven train days within a certain block of time that can be used in Italy usually for a small pass like that it would be around a month on most passes it will say right next to it how long the time frame is now you could use these days back to back or spread them out throughout the whole month that is up to you and your travel plans two quick sidebars here first it is important to note that your past does not start the day you buy it but it starts when you activate it for example if you're going to Italy in three months and you want to buy your pass now you can go ahead and buy it and then activate it the first day you are taking a train in Italy once you activate it that month clock you have to use those train days starts ticking so you can buy it now and then activate it when you are traveling I usually do this since I know I'm going to buy it anyway that way that money's already gone and if I'm buying it the day before I leave then you're just taking a big hit when you're about to spend a bunch of money I don't like I don't like that feeling I like to just get it done with no I have it and then not spend a bunch of money right before I'm about to go spend a bunch of money and our second sidebar is that the global pass does have some different options but we'll talk more about those later but for now let's get back to our five day pass in Italy I'm picking five because I'm tired of saving three five and seven but I'm sure you're tired of it as well each time you use your pass it's considered a train day that means you can hop on and off as many trains as you want throughout that whole day and it still only takes one day from your past it's super important to note that a train day is from Midnight to midnight it's not from your first train that day this is important because it can get you in trouble say you're taking an overnight train that leaves from 8 pm to 2 A.M well that is going to take two days of your past the first day of your past would be 8pm to midnight and then the second day of your past would be midnight to 2 A.M so that is super important to keep in mind when picking how many train days you need the global pass works pretty much the same way where you can get x amount of days in one month or two months but it does have some different options it passes that range from 15 days to three months and these passes work like a ticking clock once you activate them the clock starts ticking and within that time frame you can hop on and off the train as much as you want say you have a 30-day Global pass once you activate it the 30 day starts and within that time frame you can take as many trains as you want and take 30 40 50. that's a lot of trains I I don't recommend taking 50 trains and 30 days I don't recommend taking 15 trains in 30 days really easy to tell the difference between these passives if it doesn't have a set amount of days beside it like three five or seven if it just has a time frame like 15 days or one month or two months then it is a continuous pass which are my favorite passes I always try to go for these passes because it gives you a lot of freedom to move around change your trip you don't have to stress that maybe a train got canceled and there's no more trains that night but you already activated your password so that's a wasted day it just gives you more freedom to move around and less stress so I recommend them and they're also good for anyone that doesn't have concrete plans that likes to go with the flow these are great passes for you if you're very organized and you know you're going to take four trains in two weeks then you might want to get one of the other passes it will save you some money because these Global passes do cost a lot more so if you're on a tight budget even if you're not on a tight budget if you know that you have a very limited amount of time and that you have a very set plan of what you want to do and see then do not splurge on the globe double pass instead get the past that suits your knees it will save you some money it's better to do that than to spend a lot of money hoping or thinking you might need those extra days you probably won't you could always maybe pad one extra day onto your past than what you're thinking or just pay out of pocket for that extra ticket if you need it it will be a lot cheaper in the long run okay so now we know what URL passes are and the different types of passes you can get but now let's actually talk about how they work and here we get to the biggest downside of your Rail Pass and those are seat reservations just because you have a pass don't mean all trains in Europe all the time are free on some trains you will have to pay a seat reservation whoa whoa calm down give me a second and I'll tell you while your rail is still very helpful even if you do have to pay these reservation fees and I'll show you how to get around most of them at the end of the video I just want you to keep watching first of all you don't have to pay these fees on every train in Europe it is mainly on the most popular routes during Peak Travel season but even in the off season you'll find places where you have to pay these reservation fees and there are quite a few of them throughout Europe the good news is is that these reservation fees are much cheaper than if you would have just bought a ticket for example on my trip to Rome tomorrow I had to buy a reservation from henberg to Munich that reservation fee cost me I think 4 Euro 50 and just doing a quick search for train tickets I can see that that route usually costs between 50 to 150 Euros so it is still a bargain I'm okay with four Euros 50. but I do hate reservation fees what's even cooler about using URL is that now it is super super easy I don't want to age myself but when I first started traveling my first couple year rail passes you had to get a physical pass sent to you and I was always afraid because if I messed up or if that train got canceled it would take up a precious slot in your past and you only had a limited number of them so it was actually a little stressful sometimes today all of it is done through the app although you can request to get a pass sent to you if you still want to go old school but I highly recommend the app because it's super easy to use you can turn off and on train tickets with the click of a button easily add a new train if something comes up and on certain trains you can even make reservations although it's not great I think that is one thing that they need to improve quickly they should just make it where you can make it all the reservations you need on the app easy because right now it's a bit of a pain all right let's talk prices prices change depending on your age or the type of past you're after and how many countries you want it for if you're under 26 it's a lot cheaper if you're over 60 it's also a lot cheaper but if you're in the middle like me you pay the highest price you can also pick between first and second class I've had a first class pass before and it is really nice some of the trains will have snacks and coffee they're better seats they're less crowded and overall it's nicer but those facets are a lot more expensive and honestly I don't think it's worth the price unless you're traveling places like Hungary or Serbia things like that where the trains are kind of rough then first class might be nice but I've never been in first class in those trains actually so I don't know I would say overall it is not worth the price increase to pay for a first class prices start as little as 80 dollars for a single country pass and as high as a thousand dollars for a three-month Global pass and your rail does offer sales sometimes it's usually ten percent off earlier this year they had a really really good sale that was like I think it was 50 off and that was for a big anniversary that sale is not coming back around there is no way don't wait for it if you see 10 off go ahead and grab it and also have links down below to check out some of the passes for yourself these are affiliate links which means you don't pay any extra but I get a small commission for referring you which goes directly to helping ginger on the go keep going how do you figure out if your Rail Pass is worth it for you there's no easy way to do this you just have to do the math you sit down write out your itinerary right how many trains you think you need then go to the country's website or a third party site like Rome to Rio and see how much those train tickets cost train tickets do change they go up and down quite often this doesn't need to be an exact number you can just get an estimate and then compare that to the price of the pass and see if you think it would be worth the money I find that it's usually worth the money when I was traveling in France with my mom a couple months ago she was booking her train tickets or getting ready to and I said well let's add these up first and we ended up getting her URL pass and saved her like 250 dollars so let's get to a couple of my year Rail Pass hacks first of all to avoid reservation fees this is an option it's easy to avoid these fees just go into the apps search for the trend you want if it says reservation well you can go into the filters at the very top you will see the filter for only finding trains that do not require a seat reservation these trains do take longer but you won't have to pay that extra fee so it might be worth it depending on what the reservation fee would be a lot of people don't know that the URL pass also comes with Benefits that can give you discounts all over Europe all you have to do is go to more in the app go to benefits and there you will see a list of benefits and you can search by your destination and like I mentioned earlier there are sales if you're not traveling until next summer or a few months you could check every week to see if a sale has started and you might be able to get 10 off also you can check the links below because you're a good person and that is it guys that is our urail explain video if you liked it hit that like button and thank you for watching and until next time travel with confidence see you guys soon

Channel: Ginger on the Go

Views: 70,026

Keywords: Eurail Pass, Eurail Pass 2022, eurail global pass, eurail pass reservation, eurail pass details, interrail europe, eurail pass how it works, eurail seat reservations, eurail pass where to buy, interrail global pass, how to use interrail pass, eurail pass info, interrail pass how does it work, eurail global pass explained, eurail pass how to use, eurail, europe, travel, travel questions, eurailtravel, austria, germany, eurail pass explained, eurail pass review, interrail pass

Id: SvUsEM9Vejk

Length: 16min 10sec (970 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 24 2022