I will be in Budapest and then going to Prague and can not seem to find any cheap airfare. (Anything under $200-$300 for a one way). Has anyone taken the train? I have hear it is hard because you have to enter a 3rd country and can't buy the tickets online????

Is it worth renting a car one way? There will be two of us to split that bill is so. Any help and direction would be much appreciated as we have a good deal on airfare to and from Europe, but don't want to blow too much getting from the one city to the other. I will be going in 2-3 weeks. Thanks, JB

Being routed through Slovakia is really not a problem in any way. Otherwise you can take a train to Vienna and connect from there to Prague if there is some reason I can't think of for you to avoid Slovakia. Again, there is no problem in any way, with going through Austria.

I usually buy rail tickets at the train station. Many online services charge higher prices, sometimes much higher. The only exception I use for buying tickets online is where I can deal directly with the national railroad company (NOT RailEurope) and can print the ticket on my printer rather than having it mailed. The Swiss railroad is one that works like that which I have used recently and the price is the same as at the station.

I've just had a quick look at raileurope.co.uk and can tell you that you CAN book online - fares start at GBP 67 one-way which works out at about USD 97.

A one-way car rental is likely to be VERY expensive because there is a hefty surcharge for dropping off a rental car in another country.

If you can wait until you arrive in Budapest, and can buy the ticket at least 3 days before you leave (or get someone to buy it for you), there is a fare of only �19 inc reservation which is available on three daytime Eurocity trains.

OP it wont be cheaper then teh train, but as over here in the States, one-ways are usually more expensive then round-trips.

Did you price a r/t tkt, fly 1 way and throw away the return!

You can try click4sky.com, its actually CSA flights, but you gotta buy roundtrip, but the roundtriip costs around $150 BUD-PRG-BUD.

Smartwings.com also flies the route for under $90 a couple times a week

Otherwise, buy the train ticket once there, its super easy, no need to use raileurope.com, which IMHO is a big overpriced scam.

Right around Christmas we took the same train from Prague to Dresden & back. The return train started at Berlin and was to end its journey at Budapest.

We had no trouble just walking into the train station at Holesive (sp?) 3 days before Christmas, buying the tickets & getting on the next train. The tickets were not tied to specific trains, just try to be there when your train first pulls into the platform so you get the best choice of seats. I doubt it would be much different originating in Budapest.

Yes, you will save few dollars/euros buying in advance, but we decided it wasn't enough savings to worry about it.

Was faced with the same situation this summer (getting my wife and I from Budapest to Prague). You have to take the train via Vienna or Bratislava. No issue going via a 3rd country, but it does end up being a very long day.

When I looked at the schedules, it would have basically wasted a day in transit unless we overnighted. So we ended up taking a Eurocity train to Vienna late on a Friday evening (little less than 3 hours, got in for dinner) - spent Saturday in Vienna - and then hired a driver to pick us up 7 AM Sunday in Vienna and take us to Prague (we made a whole day of it - stopping in Trebic, Telc, and Cesky Krumlov). The latter was not the cheapest way Vienna to Prague - getting back on the train was about 1/2 the cost - but we wanted to see some other parts of the Czech Republic.

Since you are going all the way to Prague, not sure if OBB operates the entire route (the Eurocity from Budapest to Prague was OBB)? I was worried about having seats since it was summer - so wanted to book in advance. I was not able to find a place to book online except for agencies that would charge a fee (which I was not willing to pay). But once I figured out OBB was the operator, I used google language tools to translate the OBB website and eventually found a way to submit a request to them for Ticket by Post. That put me in touch with an agent in the Vienna ticket office and she was able to book my tickets via email exchanges. The main challenge you will have is that you need to have enough time before you leave for the tickets to come to you via air mail - if you are traveling in a few weeks, not sure you have enough time. But as railways and rankourabu said, you can easily book once there.

As to renting a car - we started our trip in Poland and doing a one-way rental within the country was ok (in our case, pick-up in Warsaw and return in Krakow). But the minute you took a car across a border, it became very expensive (before even factoring in gas).

In the case of Budapest - Prague, the walk-up fare is more than twice the advance fare. This may well be significant for some people.

The EC trains between Budapest and Prague are operated by Hungarian or Czech railways. They do not pass through Austria.

Look at the CD (Czech Railways) website, it is possible to buy an e-ticket online from here. There is an option to switch to English. Fares are from €19, so it's well worth doing.

That is so much better than the Hungarian railways (MAV) website.

Thanks railways and others for your input. Is the 19 Euro price tied to an advance? I will be arriving on a Monday afternoon and need to head out on Wednesday night if posibble.

I have seen some conflicting things in this thread and do not want to go from 19 to 150 on each ticket if I miss the advance. I will also try the RT air. Thought I did, but will check again. Thanks, JB

Yes, unfortunately. So it will be too late on the Monday afternoon for a Wednesday departure. It would be OK for a Thursday departure if there are tickets still available (there usually are in low season).

BTW. Train tix from BUD-VIE were MUCH cheaper than VIE-BUD (this was with a no-advanced-purchase reservation). I was very surprised to have gotten a handwritten ticket for BUD-VIE.

Have you considered a stopover in VIE or BTS?

The normal "walk-up" fare Budapest-Prague is �75. Shame you are not doing round-trip, since that is only �90.

The Budapest-Vienna "full" fare is 30% off the standard international tariff, while there is no discount Vienna-Budapest.

The advance fares are also cheaper - �13 either way if bought in Budapest, �19 if bought in Vienna.