I’ve taken my share in the past several years, from or to Sofia, Plovdiv, Vaduz, Luxembourg City, Zagreb, Ljubljana, Bratislava and whistlestops inbetween. I write to share what I’ve learned.
PUNCTUALITY PROBLEMS
An Achilles heel, and not one I’ve read much about in web sites geared toward tourists. I am immensely fond of these rail trips, but would have been fonder still if I hadn’t had to learn about the punctuality problems through unpleasant personal experience.
I’ll start with a best case:
The Swiss Federal Railways transit planner informs me that at 8:05 a.m. on a Wednesday I can travel cross-country from Geneva to Appenzell aboard four trains, with transfer times of four minutes in Renens, twelve minutes in Zurich, and seven minutes in Gossau. Just under five hours total.
I believe the Swiss Transit Planner. The sbb.ch data center — undoubtedly tucked among bell-swinging cows on an Alpine meadow, and monitored by lederhosen-clad sysadmins who yodel their way through rootkit scans; we all know how accurate these stereotypes are — can see into the future, decrees that at 13:00 that Wednesday Appenzell station security cameras shall record me toting my rollaboard up Platform 4a. I’ll betcha they’re right.
But: that’s in Switzerland, in a trip aboard all-Swiss trains. Not everywhere in Europe. In Switzerland.
On to a less-agreeable example:
Last October the sweet-talking German Deutsche Bahn transit planner suckered me into thinking that at 7:25 on a Friday I could board a Slovenian D214 in Ljubljana for a three train, seven-and-a-half hour trip to Bratislava, with a seven minute transfer at the Villach station in Austria. And, maybe I could have!! … on most days, or on some days, perhaps, or maybe when the moon was full and Sagittarius was ascendant and Jupiter was in the eighth house. But I certainly couldn’t last October 31. The 214 arrived in Ljubljana eight minutes late, was twenty minutes behind schedule by the time it reached Villach. I can be a spry old duffer, but have never gotten the hang of time travel, couldn’t slip into the past to board a Vienna-bound train that had already left. Adios, travel itinerary.
European train service, you see, is not created equal. An online graphic uses 2019 data to rate for efficiency, predictably awards first place to Switzerland, and ranks Albania dead last. In September Spain transport minister Óscar Puente raised eyebrows by awarding the continent’s second place to my expat homeland. Not quite, answers a Euronews article: Spain is indeed up there, but in the fifth spot, not second, a nose ahead of France and far ahead of Italy and the now embarrassingly stink-o Germany.
Happily, I can offer two reasons that these punctuality issues shouldn’t party poop a straphanger’s dream trip to Europe:
(♦) If the missed connection is their fault, you’ll likely have the right to get on the next train.
That’s what the ticket agent promptly told me when I sought help in Villach. An online “Agreement on Journey Continuation” says as much. I am TOO OLD AND LAZY to investigate which Europe countries follow this practice, or to Sherlock potential ‘gotchas,’ but I’d be surprised if it’s not the norm. In Villach, I wound up eyeballing a lot of attractive scenery I wish I hadn’t had the chance to see, and boarded another train about an hour later.
(This second train, incidentally, was also late, pulled into Vienna more than forty minutes behind schedule. I missed my connection there, too … and would miss it the next morning as well, as the EC 280 departing Bratislava would arrive too late in Kolín for my hoped-for transfer to Kutná Hora.)
(♦) You can finagle settings in the online trip planner to book a more generous transit time.
You’ll find the option at int.bahn.de, cd.cz, oebb.at, sncf and even sbb.ch. Snoop around, see for yourself. I discovered the option while prepping this post, will be a frequent future user.
MANY OPTIONS FOR TICKET PURCHASE
European train operators have figured out that international tourists want to give them €$¥£฿ to frolic about the continent in Old World trains. They might not always be able to operate those trains punctually, but the ‘giving them €$¥£฿’ part they’ve figured out. Buying advance tickets online seems to get a little easier every year.
If one rail operator won’t sell you the tix, visit the web site of another operator on the same route. I couldn’t book my Ljubljana-to-Bratislava rides on Slovenia’s web page , but the stop at Villach encouraged me to check Austria’s excellent OBB Scotty, which was only too happy to trade PDF’d fare media for euros.
Seat61 is fond of both Rail Europe and the Train Line. I have no personal experience with a Eurail pass.
FLIXBUS ALTERNATIVE
I despaired of finding a reasonable rail itinerary from Zagreb to Ljubljana, finally let Rome2Rio steer me to Flixbus, despite dismal memories of U.S.A. Greyhound treks in the last millennium. I expected that Flixbus would inflict similar miseries.
Not at all! I easily booked a seat online, turned down the affordable option of reserving the adjacent seat to sprawl or snooze more extravagantly during the ride. Flixbus hosts a shiny-clean waiting room of its own at the not-so-shiny-clean Zagreb bus station, with pay toilet included. The spiffy bus departed and arrived on schedule. Worth a look.
BULGARIA CAVEAT EMPTOR
The Euronews article ranks Bulgaria third for the punctuality of long-distance and high-speed train service. This might lead an innocent to expect Brussels or Amsterdam caliber service.
Alas, no. A Sofia native later told me that she would have warned me about her homeland’s trains if I’d consulted her beforehand. “A Soviet Bloc holdover,” was her nutshell description. I don’t expect to drip sweat in late June beside grimy curtains in the first class car, but did between Sofia and Plovdiv.
CONSIDER WINTER TOURISM
Luxembourg is an expensive date in spring, at least if staying overnight, but far less so in winter. Ditto Liechtenstein and, I don’t doubt, many other bucket list tourist meccas. The off-season tourist needn’t exchange sharp elbows and dirty looks with fellow travelers for those prized selfie angles on Charles Bridge or at St. Stephen’s Basilica, likely¹ can grab hassle-free reservations at the Michelin-rated whatever in Madrid, Paris, London, Rome.
(¹Likely = a guess, without personal knowledge. I’m not much of a foodie. My only ‘Michelin’ experiences were with their tires, in my car-owning days. [And what fond memories I have of those tires! They were round, black, rubbery, rolled intrepidly when I pressed the accelerator. Wow.])
Now, I know what you’re thinking. Winter tourism is less popular for a reason. Rain. Cold. Ice, sleet, snow.
True, but I still think it’s a good option, for already-based-in-Europe tourists who can travel on short notice. One can diligently and patiently check forecasts at a given target destination, grab a ticket when odds are good for tolerable weather.
The one unavoidable downside, at least in the Northern Hemisphere: shorter days.
A GREAT EXPERIENCE OVERALL
Bulgaria aside, I remember only one bad train ride, when SNCF cancelled my TER 96220 out of Basel for reasons unknown and the next TER had to shoehorn in twice the usual passenger load to Mulhouse Ville. Other train treks have offered mostly agreeable memories, particularly as regard sightseeing. I heartily recommend these trips to others and plan to take others in the future … but will remember to select the ‘longer transfer time’ option in the trip planner when I do. Unless returning to Switzerland.