Travel in Europe by train is covered very well elsewhere, but just putting some links here

• www.seat61.com is a fantastic train-travel guide website which covers train travel in detail, including Ireland, Britain and continental Europe

• Interrail www.interrail.eu – while Rail and Sail is often the cheapest way of getting from Ireland through Britain by train, once you are in continental Europe (or taking the Eurostar), Interrail is great value. 
  • You buy an interrail pass which covers you for x travel days within a certain period (e.g. a month).  On the travel days (which you activate via your interrail app) you get rail tickets for free through the app  – you can travel on the dense and frequent network of regional trains impromptu.
  • For night trains, a travel day includes departures for that day (you don’t need to activate a travel day for the next morning).
  • For high speed trains, night trains and the Eurostar, you will still need to do seat reservations in advance and for an extra fee on top of the interrail pass, but it still works out better value for money.
  • If you have children – under 12s get free interrail tickets!
  • There is also a Erasmus interrail pass which is valid for 6 months instead of 1 month www.interrail.eu/en/interrail-passes/erasmus
  • If you are 17 or 18 years old, or know someone who is, let them know about this great scheme for free interrail tickets for 18 year olds ! youth.europa.eu/discovereu_en

• If you are traveling by train in Germany, you can get a “Deutschland ticket” which covers travel on all regional trains (not high speed trains) for a full calendar month for a very cheap price – see https://int.bahn.de/en/offers/regional/deutschland-ticket. You have to set up a subscription, you can do this in advance and specify the month you want it to start, but then remember to cancel the subscription before the 10th of the month in which you are using it, so it doesn’t get renewed for the next month (it will still work for the rest of the month you are in).

• Trains with beds to sleep in !  back-on-track.eu includes a great map of night trains in Europe.

See also our page on bringing a bike on trains in Europe.