Tips for Traveling Part 1: Transportation

So you're studying abroad in Europe and you want to plan a trip.  It could be as simple as a day trip to an interesting village in the area, or as extensive as a week long trip to the other side of the continent.  During my semester abroad in Mannheim, I have made quite a few trips and I've learned quite a lot along the way.

The first piece of advice I will give you is to understand that no matter how well you organize and plan, you will never see everything there is to see in the locations you visit.  Sometimes you will feel like you are just barely scratching the surface.  Don't let this bother you; the experiences that you do have will stay with you forever, and you can always return someday to investigate the stones left unturned.  Traveling through Europe these past few months has taught me that the world has so much more to offer than you can see in one lifetime.  This is a wonderful thing.

This is the first part in a series I will post about tips for traveling.  This part will deal with planning your transportation.  If you are careful, you can save a lot of money and time on your transit to your destinations.  Also there are a number of things to be aware of depending on your mode of transport that will keep you out of any uncomfortable situations.


*** Plan ahead!  You will waste hundreds of Euros if you wait until the last minute to book everything.  Buy all your tickets and make all your reservations at least a week in advance!***


-Air Plane
Ryanair Website (Careful, the color scheme might burn your eyes out) 
If you are a poor college student like myself, you're going to want to exclusively look at budget airlines such as Ryanair when you need to take a plane.  Budget airlines are incredibly cheap in Europe.  I mean unbelievably cheap.  You can get a flight from Germany to England for 15 Euros!  The best prices will be for flights in the middle of the week that aren't near any big holidays.  If you're paying more than 50-100 Euros (one way) for a plane, you're probably paying too much.  That said, there are some pitfalls to avoid when you travel with a budget airline.

The Notorious Bag Checker Station

Budget airlines make most of their money off suckers.  Don't be one of these suckers!   When you buy your ticket, they will offer you dozens of extras that you don't need.  Make sure you carefully navigate your way through the checkout process, declining all these extras.  You don't need a reserved seat, or a text message reminder, or official Ryanair baggage, or anything else besides the basic ticket itself.

Pay attention to the baggage restrictions.  Ryanair allows you to bring one carry on bag for free, but it must be less than 10 kg and must have dimensions of 55x40x20 centimeters.  It is worth it to measure your bag before you go just to be sure.  They charge a pretty big fee if you get caught with a bag that is too big or too heavy.

Plan how you will get to your departure airport and how you will leave your arrival airport.  Budget airlines tend to work heavily out of airports that are in isolated and inconvenient places.  For example, the London Stansted airport is actually like a 2 hour drive out from the center of London if traffic is bad.  You will often have to take a shuttle bus to and from the airport which can cost around 10 Euros each way.  The price of taking all these shuttles can often be more than the cost of the airfare itself.  Also, make sure you account for the length of your trip to the airport when you decide what time you want to leave.  It is infinitely better to be too early for a flight than it is to be too late.

-Rental Car
Europcar 
If you have a lot of people coming with you on your trip, it may make sense for you to get a rental car.   While the price may look daunting at first, when you split it four or five ways, it is sometimes the cheapest option.  Your American driver's license will work in Europe, but make sure not to forget your passport as well.

Most cars in Europe are manual.  If you don't know how to drive a manual, you will have to specifically ask for an automatic car.  These may be more expensive to rent due to their rarity, however you should be able to usually find one if you shop around.  I would not recommend getting a manual car if you haven't ever driven one before.  If you can drive a manual car, good for you!  You'll save yourself some money.

Driving Through Bratislava, Slovakia

Like the cheap airlines,  rental car companies may offer extras with their rentals.  Unlike with the cheap airlines, you should pay attention to these "options," as some of them may actually be mandatory.  For example, on my road trip to Budapest, I had to pay extra fees because I was under 25, planning on letting more than one person drive, and needed basic insurance for the car.  Even with these fees, the cost of getting a basic car is relatively cheap when you are sharing the cost.  However, remember that you have to put down an additional deposit of a few hundred Euros, which you will get back when you return the car.

Once you get on the road, make sure you keep track of your mileage.  Some rental cars have a 2100 km limit, after which you must pay for each additional kilometer.  2100 km is a really long distance though- it got us to Budapest and back, and the fee for extra kilometers is reasonable (around 14 cents/km).

Also take into account what you will spend on gas.  Gasoline in Germany is incredibly expensive (around $8.50 /gal) and it doesn't get much better in the rest of Europe.  Fuel may likely be the most expensive part of your trip.

One final thing to know about driving through Europe is that some countries require you to buy a highway pass, in the form of a windshield sticker, in order to drive on their roads.  These stickers cost around 10 Euros each.  Check in the gas stations as soon as you enter a new country if you are not sure if you need a sticker.  That is where you can buy one.

-Train
DB Bahn (Deutsche Bahn Bahn bahn.... bahn) 
Trains are probably one of the most relaxing ways to travel.  You don't have to think about anything while riding it, and it takes only five minutes to get through a train station, compared to the three hours it takes to get through security at the airport.  Germans love their trains: elegant, environmentally friendly, punctual, orderly... everything that the stereotypical German gets excited about.

German Train Station during my Exchange in High School

When you sign up at your German University, you will be given the option to buy a Semester Ticket for 140 Euros.  This ticket will get you unlimited rides on all regional public transportation.  The only thing it doesn't cover is the super fast Inter-Continental Express (ICE) trains.  Everything else should work; just show them this pass when they ask for your ticket.  The area the Semester ticket covers is also very large.  You can get an hour or two away for free with this pass.

Booking trains is pretty simple on the DB Bahn website.  If you think you are going to buy a lot of train tickets, you should invest in the BahnCard 25 or the BahnCard 50.  These cards will give you a 25% or 50% discount on any tickets you purchase in the future.

Another way to save a lot of money is to buy Regional Passes.  These day passes are usually around 30 Euros and will take you on all the non-ICE trains in the region you buy them for.  You can buy a Baden-Wurttemberg ticket that will take you all the way from Mannheim to Konstanz, on the southern border of Germany.  The best part is that you can share the pass with up to 5 people, which means you only have to pay about 5 Euros for a whole day of traveling.