London – Hinterzarten

First things first, travelling by train in Europe is amazingly easy.

As well as ordering tickets on Eurostar’s website, you can get some amazing bargains from Deutsche Bahn, who have an allocation of seats on Eurostar services.

Look for LONDON SPEZIAL on their website, or go here.

Standard and First Class fares are offered. Note that First Class actually entitles you to Standard Premier (same seats as first class, different food.) Standard Premier is excellent as the carriages are mid-way in the train – perfect for the Brussels short cut.

So, we settled for the first class fare, and due to our dithering, it went from €109 to €129, but considering that was all the way to the border with Switzerland, a good deal! Standard class was €99 and €119, so a real bargain upgrade.

No lounge access at St. Pancras, so settled for the next best thing: breakfast in The St. Pancras Grand.

And of course, a 2-4-1 bargain – £25 for two including a glass of Champagne is better value than any lounge!

St. Pancras station was looking as gorgeous as ever, and always holds a soft spot for me.

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Security and boarding was quick and easy, and we settled in to our seats. That looked like these:
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EuroStar is looking tired. There’s no other word for it.

At 10.58hrs, breakfast was served. Included in the train fare.
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The Brussels short cut.
The excellent website Seat 61 offers advice for people connecting onto German ICE trains at Brussels – don’t follow the crowds to the exit, look for the escalators adjacent to Carriage 11 entitled “Correspondences” – that way you avoid queues and can get straight to the correct platform.

As it’s a through ticket, your ticket is still valid should any connecting service be late.

So, on to the gleaming white Deutsche Bahn train.

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Travelling at 286kph (although on some routes even higher speeds can be achieved) gives you an appetite, and in First Class, an at seat dining service is provided. The food was good.

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This was about €10.00

Served on crockery, with cutlery. Drinks in glasses. How civilised!

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I had a wander around the train and found the quiet coach… which overlooked the drivers cab.

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On our second train, it was time for coffee and cake!

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However, it wasn’t all plain sail… training – for some reason, our train made an unscheduled stop at a place called Duren, where a train coming in the opposite direction also stopped on the adjacent plaform. Both sets of passengers were decanted and moved on to the other train. Still don’t know why.

Our second train was diverted due to ‘an issue’ which meant we missed our regional connecting train. However, the conductor announced refreshed connections for every station so was handled remarkably well.
We had a forty minute wait, however, this train arrived well ahead of it’s planned departure so we had somewhere nice to sit.

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We had arranged a taxi to meet us for the last hop to the hotel, and, advised of the delay, was waiting for us at Hinterzarten station.

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We had booked an aparthotel, so I had a massive room with a kitchen (it was never used!).

Far superior. It’s a cliche but German Railways are superb. The staff on the ICE trains were brilliant. Although I would add that storage space was an issue as was WiFi.

Their ticket machines are amazing, they also include a journey planner where you get a print out of connections.

Our trains were delayed and even diverted (and the DB Regio services had some overcrowding) but the information provided was excellent.

Great report NIR. Have to agree with every aspect as I’m also a big user of DB. Having a home in Lugano which is very central train is often faster and more convenient than air for me, especially when making multi stop trips.

With the Swiss Half Pass I also receive a 25% discount on all the DB fares which is an added attraction. DB has its own card offering 50% as well.

Both the Bahn.de and SBB.ch websites are excellent and sometimes one has special offers the other doesn’t for the same journey. Also both are also in English which is very useful.

Very good NIRscot!

Do you know this? I have never been on EuroStar.

Eurostar to get new trains

Great train check, NIRScot.

Just wanted to mention that the ICEs cannot operate at their maximum speed in Belgium because of the power supply. (The power supply in Belgium differs from that in German). This can and does affect the reliability of the service as one of our readers tells me.

Thalys seems to have mastered the technical issues on this particular line whereas the ICE still has some way to go.

The fact you were detrained at Duren (not far from the power change at Aachen) and switched to another trainset would suggest that something was amiss.

Eurostar is getting both refurbished and new trains as we have reported. But the refurbished trains are delayed by at least two years and the new Siemens e320 trains are currently being tested prior to, it is hoped, certification in 2015.

http://www.businesstraveller.com/news/eurostar-to-refurbish-fleet-and-add-new-trains

Am doing a London to Hamburg on Wednesday, thanks to the DB London Spezial in 06:50 mins.
Just a bit disappointed that it is not Business Premier on the Eurostar, as I was told ot would be. Was looking forward to check out the lounge etc, but hey ho. On theseating plans coach 8 shows Leisure Select/Business Premier. Do they use the Coaches as per demand then or how does it work? It surely cant be the same.
Thanks for a great trip report, I look forward to my journey.