Self Planned Three Weeks Trip to Europe - Bookings - Intercity Transport

So far, I have posted three parts of the whole planning process. The links for all these part are as follows:-

Part 1 - http://harshad-datar.blogspot.in/2018/03/self-planned-three-weeks-trip-to-europe.html

Part 2 - http://harshad-datar.blogspot.in/2018/03/self-planned-three-weeks-trip-to-europe_21.html

Part 3 - http://harshad-datar.blogspot.in/2018/04/self-planned-three-weeks-trip-to-europe.html

In these parts, planning, Air Ticket booking and booking of accommodation have been covered. In this current blog I would discuss the booking of Intercity transport between cities being visited. Most of our intercity travel is going to be using the public transport. However, twice or three times, we are going to drive taking car on hire.

All cities in Europe are well connected through all three mediums, Air, Rail and Road. It may so happen,  in very few cases, where there is no rail connection (we encountered such situation while looking for options between Prague and Budapest) but that is an exception.

There are large number of websites  in the cyber space who provide booking services. Some are specialist for a particular mode but generally most of them provide information about all available options and help one book any of the mode.

And the choice is nearly unlimited, particularly between major destinations. It will be possible to chose the mode  and time of your choice. Needless to say, Air travel is generally the costliest. Interestingly, we found that sometimes between some destinations, bus travel was cheaper and faster than train (because of one or two changes during train trips).

It would be a thrill to travel on high speed DB (German railway trains), ICE, TGV or similar trains. There are other independent services which run intercity in Germany (one such service is Loco more)
Buses are also aplenty and multiple companies offer services. I am told their bus services are also very comfortable.

Here is the screen shot of one such service

 This task of booking for travel between cities in Europe is a easy one. One can pick up mode as per his / her liking, departure requirements and also cost. See below to realize that we did this whole booking ourselves very easily.
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Intercity	Depart			Number
From	AT	To	At
Paris (Bercy Seine)	1600	Ghent, Dampoort	2005	Connection 803
				BUS
Ghent, Dampoort	0555	Amsterdam Sloterdijk	0930	Connection N814
				BUS
Amsterdam Centraal	1632	Köln Hbf	2022	ICE 159
				Train
Road Trip		Cologne	Koblanz	Car Hire
Road Trip		Koblanz	Frankfurt	Car Hire
Frankfurt (Main) Süd station Train	0829	Berlin Ostbahnhof (train)	1316	Connection LOC  1818/K213
(train)				Loco More
Road Trip		Berlin	Dresden
Dresden Hbf	1122	Praha hl.n.	1335	EC173
				Train
Praha, ÚAN Florenc	0700	Budapest, Népliget aut.áll	1430	ELB8801
				Euroline
				Bus
Budapest, Hungary - TERMINAL 2A	0620	Mumbai	0005/12 May	Air France Flight

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With this blog post, the series on Self Planned travel to Europe is complete. We are making a longish trip. One can make a shorter trip. Go ahead, pack and travel. The Education travel gives is priceless.