I am trying to decide whether to purchase tourist class or first class train tickets for October. Is there much difference in the accomodations other than price?

Tourist class is fine. You get seats that are a bit larger in First class, but it is not necessary to pay the extra.

I agree with Sel. I found the difference in seating/service was not worth the price differential. I would rather have spent the money on something else.

For me it depends on the length of the trip and the cost differential. If it's not much more for preferante (and in some cases it's not) and the trip is more than 3 hours, I'll sometimes treat myself.

Starprotected writes: Some trains are Todo Preferentee; most Regional trains (TRD) are 'one class.' But on some you can reserve a seat. From experience, I think Preferente is the way to go if the price difference is not prohibitive.
If you're: 1) under 26 and qualify for a youth discount; or 2) going to travel extensively on Renfe, you might look into buying a railpass (AKA Tarjeta Turistica). As I recall, the difference between ther cost of Preferente & Turistica is not that much.

Hmmm.. easy yet tough question...

It really depends on how long is your train journey. Also, how comfortable you want to be.

I took an overnight train, a Costa Brava from Madrid to Barcelona.

ONCE is enough & no more of such train !! I rather pay more for more comfort.

We bought the Tourist tickets. $30e++

The Cabin seats 8. 4 seats on 1 side, the other 4 on the opposite. On the night of my travel, the cabin was FULLhouse. So the 8 of us were cramped together for the whole night..

The other 6 in the cabin were students. THey didn't speak English.. hence communication was impossible.. Thr'out the night, they entertained themselves - talking, giggling till wee hours.

I was dead beat frm morning's sightseeing. Realli needed to catch some sleep but it was impossible. I was absolutely exhausted when I arrived at Barcelona-Sants.

I felt so terrible that I regretted not taking
the bunk beds.

Thanks for the advise....will use it in consideration.

Last Thursday night I travelled alone from Barcelona to Gijon in Asturias. The train left at 10.30pm right on the dot and we arrived in Gijon at 12.30pm Friday about 20 mins late. I reserved a bunk and slept practically the whole night through till 10.00am the next morning when I was finally alone in the compartment of 6 which was women only. For the price of 50.00euros it was fantatice value. The ticket was 40.50 and the bunk 9.50. Clean sheets and a blanket.
I can really recommend the views of the mountains of the Picos de Europa from the train. Lots of tunnels though.
I tried to book a ticket over the internet with renfe.es but I found I couldn't buy tickets for the night train. I had to reserve these over the phone. I was put through to the reservations number from the helpline number on the internet site. They spoke English but the gut on the resevations line didn't.
The other minor problem was that I had to pick up and pay for the ticket at least 2hrs before the train left. This was a problem as I live in the hinterland of Catalunya and you have to pick the ticket up from a National and not a regional Station.
However after a 2.5 hour return journey to Girona I had my ticket bought and paid for at 11.57am.
I can also recommend Asturias. Gijon is a fantastic city as is Oviedo. I only stayed the weekend but it was worth it and the 9 hour return journey by car.

I am just still so undecided on which way to go with my train ticket purchases. Our trip this fall begins with a family wedding in Zaragoza. So we want to take the train to Madrid and spend 3 or 4 days there to see also Toledo and Segovia. We then want to take the train to Sevilla and spend 3 or 4 days there and see Granada and Cordoba. Do you think I should buy direct tickets to each city or should I purchase rail passes? Thanks