Remember, of course, that local and regional train services are often bookable but not reservable. So, although you can book tickets, you’ll not be able to reserve a seat.

The three-month-rule

There are minor variations in how that three-month-rule is interpreted. For Thalys train services, linking Brussels with Amsterdam, Cologne and Paris, tickets become available three months to the day before travel. For bookings on the Deutsche Bahn website, each new day’s wave of bookings is released at midnight (Central European Time), 92 days before travel.

Eurostar services: Four months ahead

For services linking London with Lille, Paris and Brussels, Eurostar accepts online bookings four months in advance of travel. But if you want to use Eurostar’s direct services from London to Avignon in the south of France, you’ll find that Eurostar is already accepting telephone bookings for journeys up to September 10, 2011.

Looking east

For journeys to and from Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, trains are usually bookable 60 days in advance, although we have noted that for journeys within those countries, the forward booking window may be only six weeks.

Finland works on a sixty-day-rule for services into Russia but domestic trains may be bookable longer in advance. For example, they are presently accepting bookings thru late April. Finland is unusual in that its online booking system closes down at night.

Early birds get the deals

Remember that for long-distance trains in Europe, it really pays to book just as soon as you can firm up your plans after bookings open. That one-way fare from Salzburg to Amsterdam for just €39 may be there for the taking 92 days in advance, but a week later may have crept up to €69. Leave booking till just one month prior to travel and you may have to pay €99 for the same journey. Early birds get the best deals.

Rail pass options

Interested in seeing a full list of rail pass options? Visit our booking partner, Rail Europe, to compare rates, destinations covered and see their latest promotions.

The post When Should You Buy Train Tickets in Europe? The three-month rule appeared first on EuroCheapo's Budget Travel Blog.

Don’t hold your breath. The first trains will not run through the new Gotthard tunnel for another six years. Clearly, some of the pundits who dubbed the Gotthard route one of the great missing links in Europe’s rail network obviously didn’t quite appreciate that the existing Gotthard tunnel already carries several trains an hour under the Alps. The point about the new tunnel is that it is deeper, longer—and when trains do eventually start using that new route they will be able to travel faster than through the previous tunnel which is now 130 years old.

The main missing links

But the Gotthard story set us thinking about what really are the key missing links in Europe’s rail network. And we have come up with three flights of cartographic fancy, each of which would hugely enhance connectivity. All suggestions are probably utterly impractical and don’t make a shred of economic sense. But wouldn’t it be great if instead of creating yet another tunnel through the Alps, someone would burrow under the Tatra Mountains to link the Polish railhead at Zakopane with the Slovakian rail network at Poprad.

Next up on our wish list would be a railway linking Norway’s two railheads north of the Arctic Circle. A new line along the coast from Bodø to Narvik would be a treat.

Our third fantasy would extend the railway that ends on the coast of Croatia at Ploce south along the coast, thus giving a rail link for the first time to the delectable Adriatic resort of Dubrovnik.

It is interesting that the fine folk who compile the monthly Thomas Cook European Rail Timetable evidently share our thinking on the importance of these missing links as all three of our dream journeys feature as bus routes in their timetable. Buses in a train timetable. Impostors, you might say, but these are three links where even the most devoted rail traveller must resort to road transport.

The Albanian connection

And as we dream, we have another little idea. That line to Dubrovnik might usefully be extended south along the coast into Montenegro and on across the border into Albania. It is a curiosity of Europe’s rail map that the Albanian rail network exists in splendid isolation. Not a single passenger train crosses the country’s borders. Albanian trains are deliciously antiquated and unbelievably cheap. Indeed we judge the 295 lek fare (less than $3) for the train journey from Podradec in the country’s east to the Albanian capital, Tirana, is the finest investment we’ve ever made. There are few more entertaining ways of passing six or seven hours.

The post Missing Links: The Gaps in Europe’s Rail Network appeared first on EuroCheapo's Budget Travel Blog.