Couldn’t you buy another interrail pass during your travels???? I’m not very familiar with interrail, but I think you can buy the pass at any major train station in Europe. The price is based on your country of residence, but I don’t think you have to buy the pass in your home country.

My experience is that train passes (as contrasted with point-to-point tickets) are a good deal only if you are constantly on the move. If you are going to stay in some places for three or four days, or longer, you will probably save money by buying individual tickets, rather than buying a pass. Further, you limit your options with a train pass; if you catch a flight, or a ride, your pass is wasted money. I think most passes are limited to trains, so if you take a bus or a boat or a plane, those passes won’t help you.

I would suggest you review your itinerary to see just when you plan to take long train rides, and perhaps buy a short-term pass if you find you will be taking multiple long trips in some periods.

I’m not anti-train pass. Some (primarily local) passes cover multiple types of transportation and give discounts at some sites, such as museums. I have a one-year Swiss half-fare card that has more than paid for itself, since it covers trains, cable cars, boats, buses and local transportation, and we are concentrating on Switzerland and will be there three times in the year. But I think a money-saver such as that is a rare bird. I’ve not found comparable values for Italy or France.

Interrail is for residents of Europe and from what I’ve seen it’s usually a pretty good deal — particularly for lots of travel. The price is based on your country of residence and is more expensive for residents of countries where rail travel is expensive than for residents of countries where trains are cheaper. Interrail probably wouldn’t pay for a resident of UK who was traveling exclusively in Eastern Europe, but will probably be a really good deal for the beginning of Garth’s trip.

One point I should have mentioned before is that even an interrail pass probably won’t save much money for the last 1/2 of the trip, so Garth could just use the pass in France, Netherlands, Germany (and maybe Spain if the timing works out) and not worry about the rest of the trip.