Interrail around the Mediterranean

Are you interested in a trip by interrail around the Mediterranean? This year, the EU decided that all citizens that turn 18 will be gifted a free interrail ticket . It is known as Eurail outside of Europe. From a political side, it’s supposed to enhance the feeling of belonging to Europe rather than just *insert home country here*. As a European myself, I love the idea of educating young adults in this way!

Interrail around the Mediterranean

But enough of the hypothetical blabla. Here’s some suggestions for a route for the sun- and sea-lovers among us from my trip, which I sadly had to pay for. I wish I was younger.

Venice

I started in Venice, which is not the typical beach and sea city. Rumor has it though that there is a (probably crowded) beach on one of the islands. The city does have a bunch of water, which is a lovely atmosphere.  Now you probably heard that Venice is crowded as hell, which it is. But if you can manage to pull your butt out of bed early AF, you’ll see the city in the rising sun. Without the crowds. Plus, you can take a nap in the midday heat with all the cruise-line-tourists roaming around.

Nice

From Venice I headed to Nice, France. I wanted to get a smell of that fancy lifestyle the Côte d’Azur is famously known for. It has a beautiful park on top of a hill which overlooks the entire city. Take a stroll down the coast to the suburbs if you want a more authentic and less touristy feel of the beaches. You’ll see local kids cliff diving and significantly fewer sun chairs.

Cannes

On my way to Marseille I took a pitstop in Cannes to soak in some of the film glamour that you can only find in Hollywood otherwise. They actually do have hand prints on the ground, too. But it’s far less glamorous without stars.

Marseille

It’s only a short train ride to Marseille. The city has a beautiful national park where you can SUP or canoe through icy blue waters that look so fake they have to be photo-shopped. If you’re into soap, they’re kinda known for that. It at least makes a good present for your grandma or someone who has everything anyway.

The Camargue

The Camargue is just around the corner from Marseille. It definitely is worth a day trip. There’s no hostels or other cheap accommodation. If you go to Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, you can rent a bike for cheap and drive up and down the national park seeing wild flamingos, horses and cattle.

Final Thoughts on Interrail

Overall, I highly recommend you do a trip by interrail around the Mediterranean. If it’s for free. If you have to pay for it though… It’s not really worth it. A lot of trains need to be booked in advance. Sometimes that costs quite a bit. And most times it can only be done in person at the train station.
So you don’t actually have all the freedom that interrail promises you. This also means that sometimes you can’t take a train that is fully booked. If you have to be anywhere you will run into a problem. Then you might need to fall back onto taking a coach instead. You’ll have to pay for that. Also if you wanna go to Spain with interrail: DON’T. I love the country, but interrail there is a nightmare. Train reservations are expensive and often booked out way in advance.

How to have a better experience

I don’t mean to scare you off. I just want you to have a more pleasant and cheaper interrail experience than I did. It was still a good experience; some train rides were really nice (of course not passing through Paris, hours after France won the world cup), but the ride from Milan to Monaco has great views of the coastline.

What I’ve learned from my trip with Interrail around the Mediterranean

Furthermore, it taught me to always be early for a train after literally missing my first train in Venice, whoops! Shout-out to the nice train station worker who saw my face close to tears, when the train drove off right in front of me for helping me figure out which one to take instead. If you have a reservation for a later train and you know you can’t use it because you missed the first train already, they can just change your reservation for the later train to an even later one. Hopefully you’ll find these tips for a trip by interrail around the Mediterranean helpful!

Sophia Z.

I love road trips and the ocean. I used to rescue sea turtles and now do my masters in intelligent adaptive systems meaning no travel for a while. If you like my adventures, there’s more to see of them on my Insta, and, if you speak German, my travel blog.