Trip Planning

With less than month to go, most of the trip planning is now complete. All hotels are booked and all but two of our railroad segments have been purchased. The two remaining segments are short runs (2 hours or less) and you can’t buy those tickets in advance. Likewise all of our tours have been purchased and we have also purchased tickets in advance for 1) The Last Supper in Milan, 2) the ballet Giselle at the La Scala Opera House in Milan and 3) the hip-hop ballet Julio and Romea at the old Opera House in Bratislava. We are also going to try to attend a Mozart/Strauss concert in Vienna. We know this is a bit heavy on the “cultured” side of things, but it is typical of entertainment that is available and as we like to pretend we are locals when we travel, this will give us a chance to see how the locals live. Plus, none of these events requires you to know the language.

Another aspect of planning is what to bring with you. We have both done trial packing and although it is a tight fit, all our clothes will fit in a carry-on size suitcase plus a duffle. You can’t really carry too much when you are getting on and off of trains and walking between trains and to hotels. It won't be that much walking as two of the hotels are within a block of the train station and we will take taxis to the others. We do also have one “wash” day scheduled in Prague so we don’t have to carry enough clothes for the entire 16-day trip.

Czech Dumplings and Cabbage

Finally, I have been researching what foods are typical in the countries that we are going to that we have never been before. For example, Margaret has a Czech friend who recommended that we try the “dumplings and cabbage” in Prague. I believe the dish she was talking about is called “vepřo-knedlo-zelo” which is shorthand for roast pork (vepřová) with bread dumplings (knedlíky) and stewed cabbage (or sauerkraut; zelí). It is definitely on the list of things to try, along with a good Czech pilsner.

Why Go By Train?

In six weeks or so, we leave for our first trip through Europe by train and I suppose the first question anyone would have is “Why go by train?” For us it is primarily the sense of adventure. We have traveled some by train in Alaska and that was fun, but this is a much bigger undertaking.

In the past, when we have traveled through Europe, we have done it mostly by car. Having a car has definite advantages in logistics – it’s much easier to carry food, water, extra luggage, etc. – and in the ability to stop whenever you see a pretty landscape or something of interest. It also allows you to travel through the countryside at your own pace. Of course the disadvantages of car travel are mainly associated with the bigger cites, where traffic and parking are definitely problems to cope with. The train solves the problem of big cities as there is a main train station located in the heart of almost every big city in Europe.

Frecciabianca (or White Arrow train)

Therefore, on this trip, we are focusing on “big” cities. In our case, we are doing a “loop” trip from Milan to Munich to Prague to Budapest to Bratislava to Vienna and finally an overnight train back to Milan - six cities and six countries, each with different cultures and five different languages (German twice). We are taking at least one “bullet” train and that is the Frecciabianca from Milan to Verona in an hour and 22 minutes. The rest of the trains are either IC or EC (Intercity or Eurocity). These are faster trains than the regional lines and they are more comfortable but there are still some rather long segments. Not counting the overnight, the longest trip is almost 7 hours, from Prague to Budapest. There are two trips of nearly 6 hours and two more just under 3 hours.

Finally, a big tip of the cap to the Man in Seat Sixty-One. This is absolutely the best website to use for planning a rail trip in Europe. If you don’t start with Seat 61, you are faced with dealing with dozens of individual railroad websites, each run by different companies and each having different rules, even for the same trip. Seat 61 tells you where to start on a route by route basis and guides you through the morass of websites.