Ana Maria's Travel Blueprints

If you’re wondering why you should trust me: hi, I’m Ana María 👋 and this summer I organized a 15-day Interrail trip for 7 people across 8 cities. It all went smoothly — we stayed within budget, didn’t miss a single train (that we didn’t have an alternative for), and everyone survived being together 24/7.

If I were to do it all over again (which I absolutely will at some point), this is exactly how I’d plan it. Everything that worked, a few lessons learned along the way, and every little trick that made the trip run smoothly.

(P.S. I’ll be posting my full Interrail route in a few weeks — stay tuned!)

Index

• 🧭 Step 1: Deciding Where to Go
• 🚆 Step 2: How to Get There
• 🏙️ Step 3: How Long to Stay in Each City
• 🎫 Step 4: Choosing Your Interrail Pass
• 🛏️ Step 5: Booking Accommodations
• 🗓️ Step 6: Planning Your Days
• 💰 Step 7: Splitting the Costs
• 🎒 Step 8: Have Fun!

🧭 Step 1: Deciding Where to Go

There are plenty of classic Interrail routes online, but I wanted to build my own from scratch, and it was so worth it. Here’s how we reached an agreement on destinations and built a realistic route:

1. Create a group chat. If you haven’t already… what are you waiting for?
2. Decide how long the trip will be. 1 week? 10 days? 2 weeks? This determines how many cities you can realistically visit.
3. Pick your travel window.
• Have everyone mark the dates they’re unavailable.
• Narrow down to your best common slot.
• If nothing works… find new friends (kidding — kind of).
4. Vote on destinations. Send a quick poll with all the countries or cities you’re considering and have everyone vote for their top picks.

5. Plot everything on Google Maps.
• For 1 week → 3-4 cities
• For 10 days → 4-5 cities
• For 2 weeks → 5-6 cities
• Adjust based on how long you estimate you’ll want to stay in each place!
6. Sketch your route. Screenshot your pinned map and draw a logical path between cities.

7. Check if it’s realistic. Are the cities too far apart? Will you spend more time on trains than in cities?

💡 Tip: Before finalizing your route, check actual train connections between each pair of cities in the Interrail website. If a leg takes 12 hours and three transfers, skip it. Keep adjusting until you have a route that actually works. You can also check out the full Interrail railway map!

🚆 Step 2: How to Get There

Once you’ve chosen your route, it’s time to figure out how to start and end your trip.

If you’re lucky enough to live in central Europe and can hop on a train to anywhere in a few hours, you can probably skip this part. The rest of us mere mortals have to think about flights.

If you’re flying in and out, compare prices for different start and end points — you might find one direction is way cheaper.

💰 Budget hack: Create a simple Excel or Google Sheet to compare flight prices both ways for different dates. List the options, note the prices (and yes, always search in Incognito mode), then let the spreadsheet highlight the cheapest combination automatically.

(You can grab my template and make a copy — it’s super easy to use and will come in handy for the next planning steps! I know it’s ugly, don’t judge me, I just wanted to make it functional.)

Once you’ve found the best deal:

✅ Book your flights! And make sure everyone else does too. Otherwise, you’ll be planning your next solo trip.

🏙️ Step 3: How Long to Stay in Each City

Now that flights are sorted and the trip is leaving the group chat, it’s time to get into the details.

👉 My recommendation: before locking anything in, check online for how long you realistically need in each city — or just ask your AI chatbot of choice for an estimate based on your route and total travel days.

Once you’ve got an idea, double-check train schedules to confirm how many nights you’ll spend in each place. You’ll likely travel early in the morning or late at night, so consider:

• Is it a direct connection or will you need to transfer?
• Does the train require reservations? If so, are certain times cheaper?
• Would staying an extra night here actually save money compared to moving on?

📝 Pro tip: Write down which nights you’ll spend where and your train times (so you don’t accidentally “lose” a night in the middle of your trip).

🗒️ I also recommend keeping a simple document with:

• Train times — include screenshots of your routes and available train times.
• Alternative connections — if you have short layovers, list backup trains in case of delays (Interrail trains are often late — don’t rely on a 5-minute window between transfers!).
• Reservation details, if applicable.

🎫 Step 4: Choosing Your Interrail Pass

Once you’ve planned your train routes, it’s time to pick the right Interrail pass.

‼️ Important: A travel day runs from 00:00 to 23:59 on the same calendar day, not 24 hours from when your first train departs. For night trains, it still counts as one travel day unless you change trains after midnight (which would make it two).

Since you already know your train days, you can easily match them to a pass. If it fits one of the official tiers, great — you’re set!

As of 2025, here are the prices for:

• Youth passes (12-27):

• Adult passes (28-59):

If you’re between two options and don’t want to overthink it, go for the next tier up — it’s usually worth the piece of mind.

💸 Budget hack: If you’re only one travel day over the limit, check how much that extra train costs individually. If it’s cheaper than the price between two pass tiers, book it separately and get the smaller pass.

Example: Imagine I planned 8 travel days, but the pass options were 7 or 10 days, with a 49€ difference. One of my travel days was a short trip between Interlaken and Lauterbrunnen (16€).

👉 I would get the 7-day pass and book that short route separately through the SBB website — cheaper overall!

🛏️ Step 5: Booking Accommodations

For accommodation, I almost always use Booking.com — it’s reliable, easy to compare prices, and usually has the best deals. But of course, check other platforms if you have a favorite.

💸 Budget tip: Add every accommodation to your budget spreadsheet so you can track total and per-night costs per person — plus your running total!

📋 If you’re a detail nerd like me, it helps to keep a quick summary for each place with:

• City, dates, and number of nights
• Link + screenshot of the accommodation
• Key details (close to the station, shared kitchen available, luggage storage, etc.)
• Room distribution (who’s sleeping where)
• Bathroom type (private or shared)
• Total cost — split by prepaid vs due later vs pay-on-arrival
• Price per person + payment deadlines

It might sound over the top, but trust me — it’ll save you a ton of stress later, especially when it’s time to check accommodation details mid-trip.

🗓️ Step 6: Planning Your Days

✨ This is where the fun begins!

Start by listing everything you want to see and do, from absolute musts to “if we have time” stops. Include day trips, free sights, and note down any entrance fees or student discounts. Then adjust depending on time, budget, and priorities. (I used the same spreadsheet to decide where to spend my money!)

💡 Tip: Wanderlog is a travel-planning app that helps organize your itineraries. Here’s how I use it:

• Add attractions and day trips
• Group nearby sights to save time
• Estimate travel/walking time between stops
• Check closing days to avoid disappointments
• Spread out activities across different days
• Order stops by walking time and opening hours

Wanderlog has tons of features, but there are the ones I found most helpful. Feel free to explore more if you like!

🤐 Now you might think I’m a little crazy for this... but it seriously saved our trip. I made a daily overview where I listed:

• What we’d do each day (and their opening hours) in order
• Trains and local transport info
• Booked activities
• Accommodations

🗺️ Optional but 10/10 recommend: Make daily Google Maps routes for each city. When you’re on the go, you don’t want to be constantly checking what’s next — just follow the map and enjoy!

👣 Group tip: Rotate who’s in charge of navigation each day — everyone deserves a turn to just wander and soak up the city without worrying about directions.

💰 Step 7: Splitting the Costs

Talking money on a group trip doesn’t have to be awkward if you set things up right from the start.

🗓️ Before the trip

It’s totally normal that one person ends up booking flights, accommodations, trains, etc. (been there done that). But if you’re traveling with 7 people, it’s not realistic to front everything yourself. Here’s how I manage it:

✈️ Flights & Interrail passes:

Have one person book for everyone, but send the money before clicking "checkout". Always settle big expenses upfront, it’s easier and cleaner.

🏨 Accommodations:

Most places on Booking offer “pay later” options. If you’re planning months ahead, note when the first payment is due, calculate the total for all accommodations, and let everyone know what they owe and by what date. That gives them time to save up, and you’ll have the money ready when the charges hit.

🧾 During the trip

Don’t bother settling daily, it’s too much work. There are a lot of apps that help with splitting group bills and managing shared expenses, which is what I always do.

💡 Quick tip: Log every expense daily and let whoever owes the most cover the next group expense. That way, the balance naturally evens out over time, and no one ends up in too much debt.

I swear by Tricount: it's intuitive, easy to use, and gives you insights into your expenses! Here’s how I use it:

1. Create one Tricount for the entire trip.

2. Add everyone in the group and select your main currency (e.g. EUR).
3. Log every expense: Flights, trains, accommodation, food, activities, etc.
💡 Tip: Assign a category to each expense so you can later see where most of your money went.

4. Let the app do the math. It automatically calculates the fewest possible transfers so everyone settles up easily.
5. Check your trip stats! If you’ve tracked categories, you’ll get super useful insights, like how much you spent on food vs. trains, or the total trip cost per person.

🎒 Step 8: Have Fun!

I know this sounds like a lot of work — but trust me, it’s so worth it. All that planning pays off the moment you hop on your first train.

Keep your plans flexible and your mind open. Not everything will go perfectly, but that’s half the adventure.

Happy planning, and happy travels 💕

P.S.: If you’d rather skip the planning chaos altogether, I’ll be posting my full Interrail route (with exact trains, cities, and timings) in a few weeks, so stay tuned!