261–270 of 274 posts
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Interestingly enough in Europe there are places [1] where you can take a train which goes on a ferry, so you can take the ferry while you take the train [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vogelfluglinie
It's fun once then mostly just annoying (unless you are a smoker I guess). There is, or at least used to be, another train ferry between Trelleborg and Sassnitz as well.
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I took this ride once but didn't actually know that was how it worked. I woke up in an empty car clearly in some kind of enclosure. It wasn't until leaving the car and going up a set of stairs that I realized my train was on a boat. Until then, I wasn't so sure I wasn't in a rail yard or sci-fi movie.
I'm actually surprised they let you stay on the train. Both times I've taken that route they seemed pretty diligent about making sure everybody was off the train. I assume this is for safety reasons -- down in a darkened train on the lowest deck would be the last place I'd want to be if the ferry had any difficulties. I really liked the ferry experience. The ferry part is only about 40 minutes, but it's just enough t…
The pickings seemed pretty slim for vegetarians, though, which took me by surprise as nearly every restaurant these days has at least one vegetarian option. I ended up having some plain fries with ketchup.
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That's what I did when I went around northern Europe. Took the Stockholm to Malmo, and then switch to Copenhagen. Unfortunately, I don't think there was sleeper cars. That train departed late evening, got us there in the daytime. I figured if I'm paying to sleep, I might as well be moving. I only wish that there was bunks on that train.
There are sleeper compartments on the SJ Night trains – I took one to Malmö, but they also run to the north and across to Göteborg. https://www.sj.se/en/about/about-sj/our-trains/sj-night-trai...
I took the sleeper from Stockholm to Kiruna in Lapland not too long ago. Definitely takes a while but it was a really nice experience!
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Air travel is extremely tax-subsidized. If taxes on airplane fuel was similar to car petrol taxes in Europe that would be a good start. I hope there can be some sort of EU-wide agreement on that soon, because the current state of affairs is pretty silly and there is no way a single country can unilaterally impose high CO2 taxes on airlines.
I'm not sure it's very subsidised in a cash sense - when I look at the breakdown on a cheap flight about half seems to be taxes. Whereas most countries railways receive direct cash from the taxpayer subsidies ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_subsidies ). eg in the UK >Air Passenger Duty (APD) for flights leaving the United Kingdom, and not for inbound flights. You are charged £26 per person on short haul economy…
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I'd also love to see some detailed information on this. I recently flew within Germany, probably saving a few hours over the train, but much more importantly it cost half the price. Seems that for the vast majority of people who are price conscious, this is simply too significant to outweigh the environmental consequences.
Do you have a BahnCard? How much in advance did you book? Currently you can go to most places with 30-50€ if you play it right.
Sleeper trains are doing fine in Central and Eastern Europe, despite having to contend with some long running times. Sweden is trying to revive them through Denmark, which hasn't hosted night trains since 2014 [1]. There's two viable, existing routes for trains between the Central Sweden and Northern Germany. One's through the Fehmarn Belt rail ferry, and another is the long way through Jutland. Both ways take a long…
If I remember correctly, a night train from Stockholm to south Europe implies a change of train in the middle of the night in either Malmö or Copenhagen - which sort of ruins the the concept of sleeper trains.
I'm traveling from Gothenburg to Berlin basically on at least a monthly basis. Ever since I moved to Sweden 2005 I was looking for night trains to bring me to the continent but there weren't any. Early on I took day trains but they took so much time that I never had wiggle time and since the Deutsche Bahn got private they are notoriously late which meant that most of the time I wouldn't catch the last train from Cope…
> a expensive taxi
You should be able to get refunded for that, if you had a through ticket, and maybe even without a through ticket if you ask nicely (for travel to/from Germany, DB sells through tickets to Sweden via their website).
Good in theory, but implementation was poor the one time I tried it. The 6-person sleeper car is extremely cramped (2 triple bunks), and with the passport checks at border crossings, it's difficult to get a good night's sleep. Personal safety and luggage theft was a concern as well. I canceled my return trip and booked a low cost flight instead. Maybe the extra funding will improve train conditions and process.
Someone else replied already along the lines of "you get what you pay for", but I found some web pages with pictures: - The 4 or 6 person compartments (couchettes) are quite cramped indeed, but the good part is they only cost 10 or 20 euros extra compared to a plain seat. https://www.vagonweb.cz/fotogalerie/SK/WSBA_Bvcmbz.php - The actual sleeper wagons with 1 to 3-berth compartments cost more, with their prices arou…
There's still a Stockholm-Malmö-Berlin sleeper, though only in the summer. There's also a year-round Stockholm-Malmö sleeper, and in Malmö you just take a 20-minute ride by Öresund train to hop over to Copenhagen.
I took an overnight train in Sweden from Stockholm to Åre a couple of years ago. My experience was average at best, but possibly not good data. I was in a 6 person room (3 beds stacked on each side), and I ended up on the top bed. It was pretty hard to fall asleep on a slowly, but slightly rocking train, then add in other strangers you are sleeping around, and it makes it even less comfortable. I ended up just sleepi…
That sounds like a couchette (i.e. no real mattress, just a bunk). My experiences with those are also quite bad. A bed in a real sleeper cabin (with an actual mattress) is much more comfortable.
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Interestingly enough in Europe there are places [1] where you can take a train which goes on a ferry, so you can take the ferry while you take the train [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vogelfluglinie
I've taken this train from Hamburg to Coppenhagen. It's fascinating to watch the train be put on the ferry and then you got a nice ferry ride and can marvel at the size of the wind farms off the coast. I would highly recommend it if you have the time.
Also a really cool view if you take the bridge from Denmark to Sweden, windmills in the sea almost as far as the eye can see.