Europe - Package/Value Pass Suggestions?

[ejpint]

We're headed to London, Brussels and Paris for a couple of weeks in early October. Everything is booked (flights, apartments, trains), but we're working out an agenda of things we'd like to see and do while there.

When I've traveled in the past, I've always qualified for a student or young person discount, and so booked all tickets, tube passes, etc. that way. I'm no longer a young person

Any suggestions for passes that we should buy in advance, or good sites to pre-book day trips? Are the Paris Visite passes worth buying? We'd like to hit one day in Bruges while we're in Belgium, do a day trip from Paris, probably to Reims (though nothing in stone), and a day trip from London, either toward Stonehenge and Bath, or toward Leeds Castle.

[raangoli]

I've heard good things about the Paris Museum Pass, so we're planning on doing that. There is another pass whose name escapes me now, but it's priced significantly higher and has been reviewed as not being worth it. I think it's named similar to the PMP, as in the Paris Pass, but I'm not 100% sure that's what it is.

This is the one we'll be getting: en.parismuseumpass.com/. I don't think there is a need to buy in advance. We plan on getting it at the airport (I think).

[marytini]

There is a Paris Pass (not the museum pass) that is like 108 euro or so that includes museum entrance and public transport. I think for 4ish days, maybe a week. Don't quote me on that. Anyways, I think that is excessive. In Paris now. We got a 4 day Paris museum pass for 54E each and 1 Carnet of 10 metro/bus tix (so 5 rides for us both). It cost around 15E and was mostly all we needed. Paris Museum Pass includes most major museums including Versailles but nit the Eiffel tower. I think it was well worth it.

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[marytini]

For London look into the travel cards for tube and bus transport. If you buy the paper travel cards from a train station (not just a tube station. It must have the national rail symbol) you can get unlimited travel plus take advantage of some 2 for 1 museum entrance deals. I think the info is on the days outs website or something like that. The 2-4-1 deals are only valid for the day the travel card is valid( 1 or 7 days). We saved tons this way. Tower of London alone is 19 pounds to get in. We used it for that plus St Paul's, and Winston Churchill/cabinet war rooms. We got a 7 day travel card and needed a passport photo for it. Not sure if you'd need one for a 1 day travel card.

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[marytini]

www.daysoutguide.co.uk/2for1-london

The link for the deals. It seems confusing that you are buying a travelcard for the tube, but from the national rail station, but that is how it works. We bought ours at Liverpool Street station from a manned ticket booth, not one of the DIY kiosks.

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[Norticprincess]

We managed to get our money out of the London Pass for museums. It didn't include the Eye, I believe the National rail pass gets you a 2-4-1 on that, I found that out after we got back. I've found 10% off codes for the London Pass online. The Eye if you don't get that discount, you get s light discount for booking online. We'd rented a car to go to Windsor/Stonehenge, but we were catching the night train to Scotland and it was just easier to pay for it than deal with all of our bags. I did find a few day trips that did Stonehenge/Bath/Windsor, don't know which to recommend.

[Norticprincess]

We didn't get the travel card with the pass, we got the daily after rush hour transport pass. It worked for what we were doing. (we spent time in London post Scotland, just had the first day after arrival with the rental before catching the train the same night)

[Deleted]

We were in Paris a few weeks ago and found the 4-day Museum Pass worth it. We were there the first Sunday of the month and apparently museums are free then anyway so we really only used it for the first three of the four days we bought it for (the d'Orsay and l'Orangerie, which we went to on Sunday, were free). But we at least broke even and saved a lot of line time. If museums hadn't been free on that Sunday, it would have been an even better deal.

And I think it is nice to be able to walk into places that you're not sure about without having to think about what they cost, instead of having to do the "Do we 16 euros want to see this church?" math.

[mbcdefg]

www.londonpass.com/index.php?desktop=1/

www.evanevanstours.co.uk/

[hz80408]

We bought the 2 day Paris Museum Pass. We were in Paris the first week of April and despite Easter holiday/spring breaks; we didn't really have many lines were we got to take advantage of skipping ahead with the pass. We crammed the crap out of our 2 days with the pass. I'd recommend it, but I don't think it's completely necessary.
Here's what we did in Paris: shineisntalwaysshimmer.blogspot.com/search/label/Paris

(I'm in the middle of my England/London posts right now)

If you're planning on traveling National Rail, there's a coupon booklet at the stations for buy 1, get 1 tickets on several sites like Eye, Tower of London, etc. However, I believe you must have a valid ticket from national rail for the same day you want to use the coupon.

If you're not going to travel National Rail, but want to see sites like London Eye or Tower of London; I would buy in advance online. We went to the sites on a Wed and Fri morning in April and waited an hour in line just to buy tickets, before having to wait in the admission line (however, we used the BOGO, so we saved about 20 GBP each site by waiting in line).