Anybody know if/how I can travel from Bilbao to either Galicia, portugal, Italy, England or France? Wow I know I just asked a gigantic question, but where I go will probably depend heavily on how I could get there, price, time, etc. So ideas on how to find buses, trains, low price airlines etc?????? Help!!!!!!!!!
Thanks, Kelly

Check EuropebyAir.com. For sure you can fly from Bilbao to Lisbon or Porto with a $99 Europe by Air pass--but you have to buy 3 to use within a year's time. Check Portugalia directly--maybe you can get the same price or less directly from the airline.

You no longer need to buy 3 passes on europebyair. You can buy one or however many you need.

Trains on RENFE or FEVE will get you where you want to go...almost. By taking RENFE, you'll have a better shot at connecting trains.

FEVE will take the more scenic northern coast ride. You can pick up a FEVE train in Bilbao and ride to Ferrol, near Coruña for about 34 euros. FEVE is narrow-gauge track...RENFE is wide-gauge...

Go from Coruña to Lisbon without too much difficulty on RENFE.

You can take the P&O ferry to Portsmouth, England from Bilbao. I think that it might be out of service this month for repairs. It takes 2 days and is cheap (at one point they had a two-for-one deal, round trip for €49). I heard the food and drinks on-board are on the pricey side though. I know students that went and brought all their own food and wine and it wasn´t a problem for them.

You can take a bus to Hendaya(?) on the French border and then take French trains from there. I think that they have high speed trains to Paris from there.

From the airport you can get anywhere I suppose, although I am not 100% sure about Italy, I bet they have flights to Rome.

From Bilbao, you could fly to London/Stansted with Easyjet and then to Italy or France with eg Ryanair or Buzz. All these airlines are the so called "no frills" ticketless airlines and fares can be quite cheap, depending on availability.
http://www.easyjet.com
http://www.ryanair.co.uk
http://www.buzzaway.com

Kelly writes: Galicia: Take ALSA MotorCoach or FEVE (Ferrocaril Español de Via Estrecha); Portugal: Bus to Santiago or Vigo - another bus to Porto or Lisbon; England: ALSA bus to Santander - Ferry (Brittany Ferries) to Plymouth (U.K., runs 4-times weekly (in season)); France: MotorCoach to Irun/Hendaye.

I just was looking and yes you have flights from Bilbao to Lisbon, and also to Milan, Italy. Lufthansa also has lots of flights from Bilbao to Frankfurt, their hub, and you can get anywhere from there too.