Meeting Your Trip in SALZBURG

This page offers help (concrete or informational) on reaching your trip. Topics include...

1. Where you Join Your Trip (see immediately below)
2. Our “Access Packages,” designed to help you to do so.
3. Suggestions on how to time your trip to the trip, whether you are having us arrange your travel, or doing it yourself.
4. Service information regarding train travel to your trip start location.
5. Suggested pre-trip visits, especially when these are not geographically obvious, but are rendered economical and convenient by direct rail connections.
6. Hopefully helpful hints for those setting up their own travel to the trip.

If you wish to arrange some or all of your travel through us, please tell us what by means of this response questionnaire, designed to collect all the information we need to be able to book your travel.


1. WHERE and WHEN Do You Join Your Trip?

Your trip meets at our Salzburg hotel, Monday evening.
You need not arrive in time for dinner: this is intentionally made one of the trip’s “independent nights,” as our guests persue a variety of projects, some incompatible with an organized evening meal.

We will send you details of meeting time and place with your final itinerary.

If you wish to make your own way to the trip (in other words, not to set up your travel arrangements through us), a couple of hints on getting there are offered at the bottom of this page.


2. Our ACCESS PACKAGES
as of January 1, 2005

Our “Access Package” includes a train ticket from Munich, the closest “serious” airport city (Vienna is not much further, and an option exists to take the train from Vienna, instead). Our London Access Package includes a Su overnight train from London.

Base (Starting) Access Package Price: 23 €.
If you are a North American traveller, the $ price (US or Canadian) on your price chart applies until 35 days prior to trip departure. Otherwise euro prices are transcribed to your invoice in its currency, converted at the exchange rate of the day on which the package is requested (rounded to the nearest whole dollar or pound). Current “mid-market” rates can be consulted from the site we use for conversion. We use the mid-market rate on the day of conversion, and add 2% to cover currency broker exchange commissions (our conversion rates are thus as good as, or better than, any you could obtain, including via your credit card, unless you are a professional currency trader).

Availability is normally guaranteed until 35 days prior to trip start (payment received by us). Within 35 days, availability must be confirmed, and costs may be slightly higher (especially the costs of shipping rail tickets). Some extra-cost options have higher prices if ordered w/in 35 days.

Included:

• Train tickets from Munich to Salzburg.
• A printed schedule / itinerary, highlighting any connections.
• Our “Route Sheet to the Trip,” helping you through your journey.
  

Options Offered at an Extra Cost (subject to availability)
Prices are in addition to the "Base" Access Package Price. For a general discussion of train upgrades, see here. Topics include the relative comfort of first versus second class, and different types of accommodation available on overnight trains.

• Tickets from Vienna, +15 euros.
• Tickets from Munich Airport to Munich downtown (for connection to Salzburg), +7 euros.
• First class train tickets (in lieu of 2nd class): +12 euros from Munich, +22 euros from Vienna.
• Seat reservation for a specific train (ticket may still be used on an alternate train, but res. charge is not refundable): 10 euros. Service is frequent from Munich to Salzburg, and Monday trains rarely crowded: seat reservations do not represent good value. Conversely, we do recommend a seat reservation for long rides from Paris, Zurich, etc., where having a non-smoking window has a lot more importance.
  

Alternate Arrangements, in lieu of our usual packages (subject to availability)
Prices are complete (in other words, they are not in addition to the "Base" Access Package Price)

• Through tickets from London: 179 euros if you are also purchasing tickets back to London, 209 euros if not, or if you prefer a changeable return (in 1st cl., add 210 euros or 245 euros).
• Trains from other points. Seat reservations are not required except as specified (in which case they are also included in the price). They are available for 10 euros, and suggested if you know precisely at what time you wish to travel, and are travelling in 2nd class.
  • From Prague: via daylight train, 59 euros 2nd class, 89 euros 1st class, 79 euros 1st class discount rate. Via overnight train, 99 euros including a couchette, 129 euros in triple sleeper, 159 euros in double sleeper, 199 euros in private single cabin.
  • From Budapest: 75 euros 2nd class, 109 euros 1st class, 89 euros 1st class discount rate.
  • Zurich, or Zurich Airport: 85 euros 2nd class, 119 euros 1st class, 99 euros first class discount rate.
  • Frankfurt or Frankfurt Airport: 95 euros 2nd cl., 149 1st cl., including fast train supplement (IC or ICE).
  • Paris. Overnight: 159 euros, 119 euros discount rate, includes a couchette on board. Daylight: 119 euros 2nd class, 169 euros 1st class, 125 euros 1st class discount rate. Paris airport train tickets are also available, from Charles de Gaulle or Orly to Paris center. Follow this link for details.
  • Venice, overnight, including a couchette on board: 99 euros.
  • Florence, Milan overnight, including a couchette on board: 119 euros.
  • Overnight trains also available from Rome, Berlin, Amsterdam, Copenhagen... 139 euros Rome, 169 euros from all other points (139 euros discount rate).

3. TIMING Your Trip

Many people profit from their arrival in Salzburg... to visit Munich. If your train brings you in via that route, you may wish to go for a morning walk there, before continuing to Salzburg in the afternoon. That said, Salzburg is also one of Europe’s most beautiful cities.... While you will have a bit of time to explore on the first full day of your trip, it is never enough....


4. Service Information
Schedules are approximate – exact timetables can be consulted at http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/fares_schedules/index.htm.
Best trains are mentioned. Others are slower or have multiple connections.

• From Munich. Hourly service, 2-hour trip. Munich Airport is linked to the main train station via a frequent shuttle train.
• From Vienna. Trip time is 3 hours, trains run hourly.
• From Prague. Daylight services take circa 7 hours. Departures at 9a (one connection), 10a (3 connections) and 3p (2 connections, mid section of 2 hours offers only 2nd class service). While daylight services do not require reservations (and we do not recommend them), they do operate via 3 different routes, and different tickets are required for each. Please tell us on which train you wish to travel, so that we may issue the appropriate ticket. Overnight service is via Munich (7a morning connection in Munich, stop-over allowed for no additional cost).
• From Budapest. 7-hour trip, trains every 3 hours with a connection in Vienna. One direct train at 1p makes the trip in 6 hours.
• From Zurich. Trip time is 6 hours, trains run every 2 hours.
• From Frankfurt or Frankfurt Airport. 6-hour trip, hourly trains, w/ connection in Munich (bi-hourly direct trains from downtown).
• From Paris. 11-hour trip, trains at 6:30a,10:30a or overnight (10:30p). Connection in Munich.
• From London. 5:30a daylight train, 6:30p overnight, change in Paris and Munich. 15 hours, plus a one-hour time change.

5. Suggested PRE-TRIP VISITS

Venice. Many Marbles come up from Venice via the Sunday night overnight train, so you will rarely make this trip alone. Munich is another interesting regional attraction. We offer “Blue Marble” hotels in both cities.


6. Hints on TRAVELLING INDEPENDENTLY to the Trip
Guests subscribing to an “Access Package” need not read this section.

See also “Timing Your Trip” and “Service Information,” above, as either of these may additionally help.

We gladly provide travel consulting (schedule or routing information) concerning pre-trip individual travel. In particular, we have invested a great deal to become railway experts. Our service fees are reasonable: a 20 euro charge for all but the most complex projects – or the most simple (for instance, only a 10 euro charge applies if the service is limited to the preparation of a routine rail ticket). You will generally find them well-justified by the time they will save you in research, standing on line, overpaying for your tickets, or all three.

But, for some, this type of research is fun. So, here are some hints, intended to start off hardened “do-it-yourselfers.”

Trains. Schedules for all routes can be consulted on this web site:
http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/fares_schedules/index.htm

Salzburg is on an east-west main line (Budapest - Vienna - Munich - Strasbourg - Paris), and within easy reach of a north-south line that crosses the Alps at Innsbruck. Trains to everywhere.

Planes. Salzburg has a small airport, with limited intra-European service. Big regional airports are Munich (with rail connections directly from the airport to the main rail station) and Vienna, both with hourly trains to Salzburg. Ryanair serves Salzburg from London Stansted. Ryanair also serves Linz, 90 minutes away by hourly train.


If you wish to arrange some or all of your travel through us, please tell us what by means of this response questionnaire, designed to collect all the information we need to be able to book your travel.