how to get to Budapest...

Hello everyone,

I'm travelling to Budapest in August and I'm trying to find the easiest and cheapest way over from Ireland. Direct flight are way to expensive (about €300+) so I've booked flights to Memmingen for a start but am unsure of how to go from there!

What would you do?

any suggestions or tips would be really appreciated.

Thanks in advance

You don't say which Ireland airport you're wanting to depart from.
I'm gonna give you a suggestion - and you can come back on it, if it's too far outside your perimeter and we'll start again.
Belfast to Luton with Easyjet, then Luton to Budapest with Easyjet again. Around £170 return. Hows that for starters??

Hey Redpaddy,

Thanks for replying

I've just booked cheap flights to Memmingen and was hoping to go from there. I just don't know how to go about it... I was thinking of getting an overnight train from Munich to Budapest and was hoping you might know:

how much a return ticket costs?

how long the journey is?

and if I need to pre-book the train ticket?

thanks for all your help, much appreciated

check www.bahn.de

There are sometimes special offers for the night train to Budapest from Munich, I think with this special offer it was less than 50 EUR one-way. To get this special offer you need to book in advance over the internet.

Normal fare from Munich would be something around 110 EUR one-way, 10-20 EUR more from Memmingen. You could buy the train ticket right on the day of departure. Only for the night train you need a reservation in advance.

If you cannot get the special offer I would do the following:

Use Bayern-Ticket to get to Salzburg from Memmingen. Bayern-Ticket is a special ticket that allows unlimited travel on regional trains in Bavaria for one day. It costs 20 EUR if you are travelling alone. This is a good deal because it would cost you approx. 50 EUR to get to Salzburg from Memmingen.

From Salzburg take the train to Vienna, this will be around 45 EUR. Buy the train ticket in Salzburg from ÖBB (see www.oebb.at ) From Vienna you can get a special ticket to Györ (Euregio-Ticket) for 14 EUR. Buy the ticket at the train station in Vienna. From Györ to Budapest it will then be around 13 EUR, again buy the ticket at the train station in Györ (pay in HUF).

[ Edit: Edited on 13-Jul-2009, at 00:06 by t_maia ]

great thanks for your help. I keep checking www.bahn.com but the fares are "unavailable". do you know if i need to reserve a night train ticket?

thanks again for your help

For most of the connections the fares are unavailable online. But for the special offers the fares are available online if you look at dates that are at least 3 days in advance.

You need to select the date you want to travel on http://reiseauskunft.bahn.de/bin/query.exe/en

Also look both for trains from Memmingen to Budapest as well as trains from München to Budapest.

If you book the ticket for the EN 463 sleeper train from München to Budapest online the ticket will include the reservation for the seat. When you book you can also select couchette or sleeper car.

[ Edit: Edited on 26-Jul-2009, at 16:18 by t_maia ]

As far as I know Vienna is a cheap airport to fly on. Budapest is only about 200 kms away from Vienna. From Munich its still quite a way out to Budapest. Check on google maps which other locations are close. Slowakia is not far away either. Connections from Graz (Austria) are bad. Hopefully I helped a bit here

thanks for all your help.

It looks like i'll have to pay the full price on the day I was trying to book the special fare with a credit card but because I live outside Germany (Ireland) it will take at least 6 working days for the tickets to reach us and we're leaving in 5 days. However it does say only 2 to 3 working days on the site so I don't know what to do

thanks again everyone for your help, much appreciated

Choose the option to self-print the ticket.

When booking online through www.bahn.de you can choose between having the tickets mailed to you and self-print. There is not enough time for mail, so go for self-print. Just make sure the credit card that you use to book the ticket is in your name (or in the name of one of the people travelling with you) and that you have it with you when you travel with the self-print ticket.