Travelling from Rzeszów to Szczecin

Hello all,
I need a little bit of travel advice please. I am off to Poland in January 2014 (for 8 days) to visit friends in Rzeszów. I have since been invited to Szczecin (way away in the North West), by more friends. It's proving very difficult to arrange a 'hassle-free' journey. I was thinking first of all of taking a domestic flight from R to S but found out I need to change at Krakow. I then thought of the coach. But that only goes as far north as Poznan. Last but not least is the train. Could I buy a direct train from R to S on the day of travel, or is it recommended to book in advance.... Here's my problem.. Would you all do a 15+ hour journey across Poland? Is this the norm? Please don't think I'm naive here, but I'm just trying to step back and consider the choices. What does everyone think?

Thanks all. :0)

Should be pretty pain free. There are a variety of train options including a few direct routes from Rzeszów Główny to Szczecin Główny via PKP Intercity which will probably be around 14 hours. You can look up the route options at rozklad-pkp.pl

Other option is cheap car hire and you'll be there in 8 hours. I've used LeCar in Warsaw which was dirt cheap, not sure if they have an office in Rzeszow. Good luck and enjoy your stay.

This is comfortable and stress-free, and the OP may be surprised how good the dining car is.


A hell of a drive and 8 hours is very, very optimistic unless you do it non-stop in a Ferrari.


Maybe worth doing that - can be cheap if you book well in advance and convenient if the flight timings are good.

I'd take train from Rzeszow to Krakow (less then 4 hrs) and fly from there to Szczecin. Intercity trains are comfy but anything over 6 hours in train would be painful.

Yes, you can, but ticket bought more than 15 days before has 15% discount. More than 7 days before too, but the discount will be lower.

From Rzeszów to Szczecin is the longest possible direct route between two big cities (capitals of województwo) in Poland :)

I would recommend one of those direct trains. If this won't be in the first days of winter school holidays in Poland (20th January, when the holidays begin for students from województwos: lubelskie /Lublin/, łódzkie /£ódź/, podkarpackie /Rzeszów/, pomorskie /Gdańsk/ and śląskie /Katowice/), there shouldn't be problems with seats, but I recommend to book tickets in advance to ensure that you won't have to stand.

P.S. You go from Rzeszów to Szczecin, so even in the first days of holidays there shouldn't be problems with seats. Then the trains in an opposite direction will be busy, people will want to go to southern Poland where there are mountains.

If I'm not too late, my advice is that I wouldn't take the train as it takes about 31/2 hours between Rzeszow & Krakow as there's still a bit of track work being done, the buses Marcel or Polskibus are probably your best option, travel time with them is between 2.5 & 3 hours. Though I did get stuck in the car in traffic near Tarnow the other day for over an hour, but the trip is generally not that bad now as they've opened a bit more of the A4, & if driving by car can make it between cities in just over 2 hours.

But to be honest if your not trying to travel on the real cheap I'd just take a flight from Rzeszow to Warsaw (1 hour) and then get a flight from Warsaw to Szczecin (1.5 hours)

or another alternative if you want an interesting trip would be to try blablacar.pl :)

Take a flight from Rzeszów to Warsaw, then to Szczecin. If you are lucky you can buy a ticket for very good price. Otherwise you'll spend more then 24 h for this trip. I travelled from Rzeszów to Warsaw last month with brand new Bombardier plane. The best choice.