Our usual holiday travel consists of flying through Schiphol airport, Amsterdam and onward to our chosen destination. Our current holiday travel is slightly different. We flew into Amsterdam and for the first time in many, many years we actually left the terminal building rather than transferring to another flight. From there it is an easy train ride to Amsterdam Centraal station and onward to accommodation and sights.
I have long loved travel by train but The Wing Commander is a more reluctant traveller. I view travel as part and package of the whole experience whereas he prefers to arrive to begin the fun. However, on this occasion, and for a reason which will become apparent in a later post, I have managed to persuade him to travel more slowly and learn to love the train.
Our first rail trip was a long one; Amsterdam to Basel at over 6 hours, and it was not without its problems. As we boarded I got very excited as we were right up at the front, two seats and a glass wall behind the driver’s cab. I had never see the inside of a train cab before and looked forward to seeing the driver at work. Unfortunately, we were immediately informed that, due to a technical issue with the train, we would have to travel backwards. Also a second train was coupled to the front of ours so we looked through our (empty) driver’s cab into another cab.
By the time we were leaving Utrecht we had learned that it was the first day of the Dutch school holidays and many families were travelling without reservations meaning over crowded carriages, even our quiet first class carriage. This in turn meant it was almost impossible to access the buffet car and certainly dangerous to try to navigate the crowded aisles with hot coffee.
The train did eventually turn to head in the right direction after Mannheim but we were running late and to put the icing on the cake, so to speak, we got turfed off the train at Basel Bad rather than continuing through to our real destination of Basel SSB. This meant a run up to another platform with our luggage for the short trip across the Rhine.
Overall the journey was good but the technical issues, overcrowding, and final discomfort of unexpectedly having to change trains was irksome and not the experience I was hoping would convert The Wing Commander.
We had only booked one night in Basel. We were staying in the old city and it was very pleasant just to walk along the Rhine and admire the old buildings. It is a city that is worth visiting and probably deserves a couple of nights stay to do it some justice. For instance, we could have visited the Picasso and El Greco exhibition and, weirdly, have enjoyed the massed pipes and drums of a military tattoo had we so wished! A bit of a busman’s holiday for us coming from Scotland!
Our next train ride was shorter, Basel to Luzern, and was both more comfortable and more scenic than our first trip. The one hour and fifteen minute journey was on a ‘double decker’ train. First class was also very spacious, quiet and comfortable. From our vantage point in the upstairs carriage the views were fabulous and gave a real feel for Switzerland.
Perhaps, just perhaps, I may yet convert my OH to train travel! It helps that our destination on this part of the journey is such a beautiful city with mountains and a lake to dazzle even the most disillusioned traveller.
Significantly Different 