The Country
Belgium is a very simple country to travel round with direct international connections to many places; including London, Amsterdam, Luxembourg, Basel & Cologne.
Train Travel
SNCB operate the national rail service, throughout Belgium; also offering many cross border trains into neighbouring countries. SNCB online timetables are available, also in real time, as is a downloadable SNCB offline timetable.
A comprehensive list of both passenger and freight operators in Belgium can be found on the helpful Railfan Europe website’s Belgium page.
Train times and Tickets
Booking tickets for travel within Belgium can be done at most SNCB stations or online. If you only require reservations for either Interrail, Eurail or railway staff passes then this can be done via phone to the DB office in London.
If choosing to use an Interrail pass, either for just within Belgium, or to pass through Belgium, all the relevant details on the passes, including the different types/lengths of validity available, can be found on the InterRail website.
For those travelling from outside Europe then the Eurail Pass is your ticket to Europe, details of which can be found on EU Rails’ website.
Finally travel in Europe can be made a lot simpler by using the very, very, helpful smartphone app courtesy of Eurail. This app is available both online and offline and is always up to date (well it has been for the countries I’ve used it in; including for any planned engineering works); for me it was an essential part of my travel in Europe. This app is linked to the Hafas system, which countries like Germany, Austria & Switzerland use for their train planning online tool. Eurail has done what the individual countries haven’t though and made it available offline.
For the Rail Enthusiast
A comprehensive list of Belgian Locomotives by their respective railway system can be found on the Railfaneurope website’s Belgium page. This also explains a bit the various operators of the network and how they have amalgamated over the years.
A detailed map/atlas of the Benelux Railway Systems, which includes Belgium, is available from European Railway Atlas.
Having never been to Bruges or been outside of railway premises in Amsterdam, Easter seemed like the sensible time to visit both; while the ultimate destination was Poland. Having booked flights back from Warsaw it wasn’t until I began looking at the trip properly that I realised just how long it would take to get Read the Rest…
A quick trip away with the other half gave way to a little bit of cranking. I have to say i was truly amazed at the frequency of trains, and the amount that were loco-hauled. The fact that they were electric was irrelevant. I just couldn’t resist a bit of “spinning” about in Brussels during Read the Rest…
Having never been to Bruges or been outside of railway premises in Amsterdam, Easter seemed like the sensible time to visit both; while the ultimate destination was Poland. Having booked flights back from Warsaw it wasn’t until I began looking at the trip properly that I realised just how long it would take to get Read the Rest…
A weekend away with the other half, during which the weather was strangely quite good to us, despite the time of year. We traveled out and back by Eurostar, unfortunately our return journey was 90 minutes late into St Pancras and we’d missed our booked connection at Kings Cross. Eurostar on board staff stamped our Read the Rest…