is travelling by eurotrain really worth it

I just had a quote from eurorail to travel around europe. The quote was for about $2000aud for 2 people for approx 20days. I might be expecting too much but this appears quite expensive. I thought I might go Brussels,paris,barcelona,trieste(or somewhere close) and then back to brussels. I see that easyjet does not fly to Trieste so that puts flying out. I am 65 and still a good driver so now I am thinking I might drive this route with a GPS. How hard is it for somebody that has never been to europe to drive. (I drive on the right side).

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To answer your last question first, if you are used to driving on the right I don%26#39;t see any particular problems with driving in Europe though as you are in the %26quot;Brussels%26quot; forum I should warn you that local driving habits can be trying for anyone, and I certainly wouldn%26#39;t like to take a car into Paris.

The title of your question refers to something called %26quot;eurotrain%26quot;, but there is no such thing: eurorail is an agency (I believe, American) that sells tickets on trains run by NATIONAL train operators of different European countries; the main advantage of using it is that they deliver tickets outside Europe, plus you avoid having to deal with each individual train operator. In and between Belgium, France, Spain and Italy you would actually be travelling with Belgian Railways, French Railways etc., and could of course buy your tickets from them directly. From previous questions on here, Eurorail itself sells only the most expensive tickets on the most expensive trains, e.g. where there is a choice between a high-speed train and normal EuroCity, it will only give the former - and as far as multi-country passes are concerned, these are usually only worthwhile if travelling a lot in each country, not for single point-to-point journeys. I would guess that you could get a better price than Eurorail is offering you but you would have to cost each individual journey for your dates of travel, e.g. Brussels to Paris on www.thalys.com, Paris to Barcelona on www.voyages-sncf.com/dynamic/_SvHomePage… barcelona-trieste with RENFE (although it would be easier to fly, e.g. with Vueling from Barcelona to Venice, see http://www.vueling.com/EN/index.php), and Trieste to Brussels with Trenitalia - although I would recommend flying as well if at all possible, but the only %26quot;cheap%26quot; flight possibility I know of would be with Ryanair from Treviso to Charleroi. You can look for other possibilities on http://www.skyscanner.net/.

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PS Seem to have %26quot;euro%26quot; on the brain, I meant of course to refer to InterCity not EuroCity trains! Also I forgot to suggest you look into air passes, e.g. www.airtimetable.com/airpass_europe.htm or perhaps with Star Alliance, possibly with the addition of short connecting rail journeys e.g. between Milan/Venice and Trieste. Although this is hardly relevant to the Brussels forum, rail travel in Italy is relatively cheap and does not justify buying a country pass.