About Cisalpino:On Venezia-Milano there is only one of such train and for that Train reservation -only on Venezia-Milano however, with your ticket, is FREE. There are other trains classified ES in Italy that require a special supplement (inclusive orf reservation) that for your passes is 9500 to 13500 L ( 5 to 7 Euros ). So my suggestion is Wait until you are in Europe to reserve places

Have any of you experienced this? Should I budget more
> for transportation? Or do I need to reserve at all? Do as soon you are in Europe: Often travel agents do not know all the possible fares. As you wrote is seem that the travel agent take a 14$ commission on each place reserved !!!! And the 34$ surcharge for ES train a) does not apply to Cisalpino (that for your ticket is considered as an EC so it have FREE reservation) b) It appplyu only to one other train (1 out of the 25 daily) and ONLY to holder of a plain-one-way-ticket (your rate would be abotu 12500 L inclusive of reservation) Another IMPORTANT notice: check that the advertised rates are for each person ... once i wrote to someone telling him that he was going to be robbed, since the rates was much higher than opffical, he called the travel agent (in Wales) and was told that these were the rates ... after 6 e-mails and three calls to the travel agent come out the truth: the prices of the offer were for a return ticket and not for a one way one. After that was discovered they looked ok ... In your case they does not look ok even under that conditions. However they should be right (apart the fact that with your ticket, on Venezia-Milano section , on train 36 you do not pay reservations, but this is never advertized ) if these rates are FOR THE ENTIRE GROUP, not for each people. Check carefully.