Prague to southern Bavaria, Bayern Ticket? Bayern - Boehmen Ticket?

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Three of us will be traveling from Prague to southern Bavaria in June.  I almost bought a Bayern-Boehmen Ticket from DB for the portion Plzen onward until I read the fine print about qualifying ČD trains.  The most convenient departure from Prague, at 0914, appears not to be on a qualifying train, the EC 354 Franz Kafka, until it enters Germany and becomes a qualifying ALX train.

1.  Is my interpretation of this restriction on this ČD train correct?  If so, I'll just buy a Bayern Ticket instead, for the German portion for the three of us.

2.  To avail ourselves of the cheap domestic ČD fares, I'd then like to buy domestic tickets Praha - Furth i Wald (Gr) for that train, but I can't seem to do that through the ČD Online shop.  Are tickets for this stretch available through the ČD ticket machines at Praha Hlavni? 

3.  Or would I have to buy them in person at the station?  And if so, is there a surcharge for buying in person?

4.  If I can't buy domestic tickets for Praha - Furth i Wald (Gr), I"m thinking about buying domestic tickets for Praha - Domazlice, then short haul international tickets Domazlice - Furth i Wald Bahnhof for the same train.  Does this sound feasible?

5.  If anyone has any ideas about how I could minimize the costs further, please let me know.  Thanks!

1.Is my interpretation of this restriction on this ČD train correct?

Well, actually this is relatively new situation. Czechs decided to switch these couple Prague to Munich trains from Express (Ex) to EuroCity (EC) on domestic leg only few months ago. And although de-jure EC trains aren't in the list of allowed trains for Bavaria-Bohemia ticket, but ČD contact centre actually confirmed by email that Bavaria-Bohemia ticket can be used on those EC from Plzen onwards, so it appears de-facto in this case category switch didn't change anything. You can yourself email Czechs and ask about the same thing, they should once confirm it as they did to our email recently.

However we still will try to answer the rest of the questions, perhaps it might be useful in some other occassion

2.  To avail ourselves of the cheap domestic ČD fares, I'd then like to buy domestic tickets Praha - Furth i Wald (Gr) for that train, but I can't seem to do that through the ČD Online shop.  Are tickets for this stretch available through the ČD ticket machines at Praha Hlavni?
3.  Or would I have to buy them in person at the station?  And if so, is there a surcharge for buying in person?

Furth i Wald (Gr) is basically a virtual point (= border between Czech Republic and Germany), not a station or anything, that is why CD eShop can't sell you such ticket. However at the station it is possible to buy it for 258 CZK per person (or 580 CZK for three passengers due to group ticket discount). No surcharge. 

4.If I can't buy domestic tickets for Praha - Furth i Wald (Gr), I"m thinking about buying domestic tickets for Praha - Domazlice, then short haul international tickets Domazlice - Furth i Wald Bahnhof for the same train.  Does this sound feasible?

Yes, sure, but it won't be necessary, since you can purchase ticket till Furth i Wald (Gr) at the counter in basically any Czech station

5.If anyone has any ideas about how I could minimize the costs further, please let me know.

Well, 285 CZK (Prague-Plzen for 3) + 37,2 EUR (Bavaria-Bohemia Ticket for 3) or 580 CZK (Prague-Furth i Wald (Gr) for 3 with group discount) + 33 EUR (Bavaria Ticket for 3) is already very very cheap, so hardly you can get a better deal. Perhaps anything that can come close is super promo fare bus ticket to Germany (like 9 euro per passenger) + again Bavaria-Ticket, but still it would be more expensive.

Guy from German forum inform Bayern-Boehmen ticket is recognized in all CD trains (despite conditions on DB side state only EX, R, Sp, Os), even in SC (but for SC supplement is needed)
http://www.drehscheibe-online.de/foren/read.php?30,7401576

Guy from German forum inform Bayern-Boehmen ticket is recognized in all CD trains (despite conditions on DB side state only EX, R, Sp, Os), even in SC (but for SC supplement is needed)
http://www.drehscheibe-online.de/foren/read.php?30,7401576

Ok, so it means that people in CD info center knew what they were talking about  Now we have confirmation from two sources

Then with Prague to Plzen JT has two options: a) purchase in advance discounted tickets via CD eShop, 95 CZK per passenger or b) don't bother with any in advance purchase and just buy tickets (with group discount) before departure, those will cost 360 CZK for all three

Thank you, tUt and Maxy -- your information about CD accepting the Bayern - Boehmen Ticket west of Plzen was invaluable.  I did e-mail CD to get their take on this, and they confirmed it with an response dated 8 May.  We will enjoy our visit to Czechia and taking the CD/ALX EC train!

Buying the Bayern-Boehmen ticket for our travel date in Germany from a DB ticket machine a few days ahead of time was easy, as was buying cheap individual Praha-Plzen tickets at Praha Hlavni. It turns out that on our travel date, there were engineering works on the train route somewhere near the border, and the ČD agent in Praha helpfully advised us of a bus substitution between Plzen and Schwandorf. Although it was the weekend (Saturday), the Praha-Plzen EC train, which continued on to Domažlice, was not crowded. At the Plzen station we found the buses to Schwandorf easily enough -- they too were not crowded -- and the onward train to Muenchen was waiting for us when the buses arrived in Schwandorf. Our Bayern-Boehmen ticket was not checked at all on the bus, and it was readily accepted on the Schwandorf-Muenchen train, the Muenchen-Freilassing train, and the Freilassing-Berchtesgaden train. Although we were disappointed that we couldn't take the train the whole way, the transitions were very smooth.