Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Holidays

Use our Travel forum for recommendations on everything from day trips to the best family-friendly holiday destinations.

Help planning European Interail Trip

11 replies

Poonu · 12/05/2026 12:27

Inter railing with 7 and 10 year old - Eurostar to Belgium then where? Beginning of August for 2 weeks. Any guidance or tips please!

OP posts:
MyM8Marmite · 12/05/2026 12:47

We're doing Eurostar to Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany and Belgium again. All public transport is completely free in Luxembourg, so we've booked a Eurocamp and will explore the area for a week or so. It's our first time too!

MaybeNotBob · 12/05/2026 12:50

How many travel days?
Which region/s?
How many days in each place?
Would you consider sleepers?

Miranda65 · 12/05/2026 13:02

Look at The Man in Seat 61 website. Covers all the European routes, lots of tips, timetables and links to buy tickets.

crackofdoom · 12/05/2026 14:43

It's true, number of travel days is a crucial bit of info needed!

We have interrailed via Brussels a couple of times. The first time we stayed for a couple of nights but we weren't terribly keen on it. The second time we changed at Brussels and went straight through to Cologne for our first night (an easy change, plenty of trains), and then on to Berlin. Berlin is absolutely great, would recommend for all ages. If you're transport buffs, you could stop at Wuppertal for a ride on the Schwebenbahn.

No Interrail reservations are mandatory on German trains, but I would book seat reservations in August- we didn't and spent some time sitting in the corridor!

I wouldn't plan more than 4 or 5 stops at those ages in 2 weeks.

You could include some mountains- maybe stop at Innsbruck? (on the main line between Munich and Italy). Lots of good places in Bavaria- we really liked Nuremberg.

Then maybe cross Switzerland in a day? Again, no additional reservations needed and there are some amazing mountain railways.

Coming back via Paris would seem to make sense, and it's always a hit. In August Paris-Plage will be going on- lots of free swimming spots on the Seine and canals. We went to the one at Bassin de la Villette.

Strasbourg is an excellent stop between Germany and Paris- we loved it.

Poonu · 12/05/2026 16:36

MaybeNotBob · 12/05/2026 12:50

How many travel days?
Which region/s?
How many days in each place?
Would you consider sleepers?

14
Bel 3
Netherlands 1
Ger. 5
Po 5
But flexible happy to change dates and times

OP posts:
Poonu · 12/05/2026 16:37

Yes to sleepers

OP posts:
MaybeNotBob · 12/05/2026 18:25

OK, not going South then. Any particular preferences as to which cities you want to visit? Krakow or Warsaw, Berlin or Cologne? etc..

Sleeper trains can be better in certain directions, depending on if you like early arrivals or not (I don't!).

SummerFleurs · 12/05/2026 19:39

Poonu · 12/05/2026 16:37

Yes to sleepers

Book a sleeper for the novelty if you’ve not done it before. My DD loves doing them.

MaybeNotBob · 12/05/2026 20:11

OK, just found this interesting link showing, supposedly, all European night train routes.

I was coming on to say there's a sleeper from Brussels to Prague, and another on from Prague to Krakow (or vice versa, obviously) which could be of interest, unless you don't want to stop in Prague.

https://back-on-track.eu/night-train-map/

Night Train Map 2026 – Back-on-Track

https://back-on-track.eu/night-train-map/

Poonu · 12/05/2026 23:12

Thank you all. Will consider South and the sleepers. Sound fun

OP posts:
MaybeNotBob · 12/05/2026 23:20

There are scenic daytime trains from Munich to Venice (or various stops on the way) through the Brenner pass.

ETA: I'm actually planning that route myself this summer (in the opposite direction).

New posts on this thread. Refresh page