2005

New rail passes. The focus this year is heavily on Eastern Europe. The multicountry Eurail Selectpass family adds Bulgaria/Serbia and Slovenia/Croatia (each pair counted as one country), plus Montenegro. The carryover Eurail Selectpass countries are Austria, Benelux, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.

You can select passes for three, four or five contiguous countries, for travel ranging from five to 15 days of train travel over a period of two months. Even when they don't share a common border, countries are counted as ``connected'' if they're connected by ferry: Thus, Italy is connected with Greece and Spain; Germany with Denmark, Finland, and Sweden; France with Ireland.

New two-country passes cover Denmark and Germany, Greece and Italy, Austria and Czech Republic, Austria and Slovenia/Croatia, Hungary and Slovenia/Croatia, Romania and Hungary.

Prices. All passes I know follow two simple pricing rules: (1) The more countries covered by the pass, the higher the price per day, and (2) The larger the number of travel days, the lower the price per day. Thus the base prices of Eurail Selectpasses, for five days of travel out of a two-month period, are $74 a day for three countries, $83 a day for four countries and $91 a day for five. For 10 days of travel, the prices per day drop to $56, $61 and $65, respectively.

Many pass programs offer ``saver'' versions for two people traveling together that cut the price per ticket by about 15 percent (25 percent in Benelux and Germany).

Price changes. Several important pass families retain 2004 prices unchanged, including the original Eurailpass; the Balkan, Benelux and Scanrail multicountry passes; and single-country passes for Bulgaria, Germany and Spain. Given the dollar's drop, those no-increase rates are most welcome. Up a modest 3 percent to 6 percent are the entire Eurail Selectpass family; the European East pass; two-country passes for France and Italy, France and Spain, Spain and Portugal or Switzerland and Austria; plus single-country passes for Austria and France. The entire BritRail group is up 13 percent, and prices for one-country passes in the Czech Republic, Finland, Italy and Switzerland increase by 8 percent to 16 percent. One-country passes in Holland and Portugal are up by at least 20 percent.

First class? Many multicountry passes are available only in first class (except for second-class youth passes), and almost all offer first class as an option. Where it's an option, you find big differences in the price premium for first class. For France, France and Italy, and France and Spain, a first-class pass costs just 15 percent more than one in second class - to me, a reasonable price for the extra room and service. On the other hand, the first-class premium is a stiff 40 to 50 percent in Austria, Britain, Finland, Germany and Switzerland: Given the adequate comfort, I think I'd stay with second class in those countries. In between, at a 25 to 30 percent premium, you find Italy and Spain.

Buying a rail pass. The basic rail pass rule has always been, ``Buy the minimum that covers your itinerary.'' Beyond that, I can't begin to compare all the options. Instead, I suggest some good resources to plan your trip in detail. Start with the free Rail Europe brochure or Web site . But also figure on buying the current edition of the Thomas Cook European Rail Timetable (for routes and schedules) and Frommer's Europe by Rail or Europe By Eurail, or Britain by Britrail (both by LaVerne Feguson-Kosinski), for detailed recommendations. You can buy passes through Rail Europe, other online agencies or your local travel agent.