Germany August 2014

This is an extract from a multi-country report to read the full report use the following link:

Multi Trip Switzerland – Slovenia – Croatia – Hungary – Germany August 2014

This trip was a week specifically to do Slovenia & Hungary:

Having been bowled for doing Slovenia earlier in the year when the storms hit and damaged the wires, which resulted in the Citadella not running, the opportunity to go arose and with even more on offer than usual it would have been rude not to take it while it was there. A nice move fell into place, which involved overnights into Slovenia from Germany, after flying into Switzerland, and out of Slovenia to Hungary, and from there to Berlin where I flew home from. With all the strange things happening in Hungary over the summer timetable it seemed like a safe bet to do something different and there was still plenty on offer and having kept an eye on things leading up to the trip I was even changing my plans/hotels only a few days before heading out.

Flights

Booked through British Airways

BA8763 0700 LondonCity – Zurich £78.69

BA0985 1710 Berlin Tegel – Heathrow £43.69

Train Tickets

Booked through EU Rail

5 in 10 Day Global Inter Rail – £234

3 Day Slovenia One Country Inter Rail – £68

Reservations booked thorough Deutsche Bahn UK

EN499 2340 Munich HB – Ljubljana – €33 for a single bed in a two berth sleeper

IC1604 2128 Pivka – Zalaegerszeg – €30 for a single bed in a two berth sleeper

EN476 2005 Budapest Keleti – Berlin HB – €39 for a single bed in a two berth cabin

Monday 18^th August 2014 (Upstairs or Downstairs?)

I was awake just before the alarm went off at 0355 so got up and utilised the facilities before standing at the gangway door at the rear of the coach, which was now the rear coach of the train having lost some coaches at Breclav, trying to figure out where we were; what was clear was the fact that we weren’t anywhere near Praha Hlavni Nadrazi though and we ultimately arrived there 45 late.

While waiting for the train to come to a stand in Praha Hlavni Nadrazi a different sleeper attendant wanted to know what I was doing. It was as though you weren’t allowed to go anywhere other than between your berth and the bog so this time I told him straight that I was going to get the engine number; this brought a strange look of disbelief but soon had the attendant going back to his attendant type things and leaving me be.

CD’s 362164 was just being hooked off as I got to the front of the train and by the time I got back to the opposite end of the trains CD’s 371002 was already buffered up and waiting to be attached. That was easy, although I’d been out of bed an hour waiting for the train to arrive at Praha and had stayed out of the compartment so as not to wake the guy I was sharing with; who as it turned out slept solidly all night and didn’t hear me at all!

More doss soon came but it was unfortunately broken just after 0700 by the noisy kids in the next compartment and by 0800 I gave it up as a bad job, the 0830 alarm call going off in the compartment eventually waking Mr Sleep in the upper berth for breakfast to be served. And a pretty poor one it was, with just a croissant, butter/jam and a coffee; a very poor show indeed.

The guy in my compartment was that immersed in telling me about the issues DB had suffered with their S-Bahn that he ultimately missed getting off at Berlin Sudkreuz as he wasn’t ready; I didn’t though and got off for him instead. As we were 10 or so late there was only a few minutes before IC2302 Nurnberg – Berlin Gesundbrunnen would follow us in and it was spot on time with 120103. The guy’s story about the S-Bahn had been interesting though and he’d been explaining how DB had done away with the platform staff at stations and had introduced a new CCTV system to allow drivers to close the doors without being given a tip. Unfortunately for DB this new system wasn’t operational for D-Day so DB had to rely on the drivers to do things manually, which resulted in them having to exit their cab to make sure all was well before closing the doors. What nobody had taken into consideration was the fact that the EMU cabs would ultimately suffer as a result of the doors being opened and closed all the time and the electrics eventually started to fail as they weren’t being cooled enough by the cab air-con and moisture was also getting into the systems as a result. These apparently weren’t good times for Berliners and he went on to say that the outside perception that DB used to be very efficient has never quite been the case.

Upon arrival at Berlin HB off IC2302 I had literally 4 hours before I needed to be airport bound for my 1710 flight back to Heathrow from Berlin’s TegelAirport. I’d done myself a simplifier for the hauled trains that would ply the downstairs platforms during my time in Berlin, including the IC’s, which covered Gesundbrunnen to Sudkreuz with Hauptbahnhof & Potsdamer Platz in between. Upstairs was a lot simpler in the fact that the Magdeburg – Frankfurt RE’s were every 30 minutes and you could do out and backs to Alexanderplatz in 18 minutes; these allegedly being the only hauled stuff upstairs; this was not the case on this particular day and I never made it to Alexanderplatz either!

To prepare myself for the leaping around that would follow I made a note of the platforms that the relevant trains would depart from to make life a bit easier during the short pluses and by the time I departed Berlin HB on my first 112 of the day at 0932, I was fully prepared for the 4 hours ahead; which surprisingly went a lot more smoothly than I ever expected.

Trains were largely on time on the downstairs section with the only late running seeming to be on the xx:39 departures from Potsdamer Platz into Hauptbahnhof but as these trains yielded the biggest pluses of the day, at a massive plus 9, there was a bit of leeway and I only had to get a shift on upstairs once and likewise only once in the opposite direction back downstairs. There were a couple of near misses while running for tight pluses downstairs to downstairs but not one missed; that I went for anyway.

Timekeeping on the upstairs section wasn’t at all good, hence me never actually making it to Alexanderplatz and every move I did involved bailing at Friedrichstrasse. Still the late running did get me more engines in some cases and it seemed that there was some vice EMU’s out too, namely 143065 & 143210 on Berlin Ost – Berlin Zoo shuttles all day, when they weren’t caped, and 143931 on a Berlin Flughafen – Nauen turn, which even had Ersatzug in the window display.

The moves worked out quite well in the end as when there’s a lull on the downstairs section from xx:42 to xx:16 there’s a move on the upstairs section to fill in the time, departing at xx:51 and arriving back at xx:09. Everything seemed to stick to diagram and the 4 hour manic bash was finished off by doing IC2208 Sudkreuz to Gesundbrunnen with 120101 for 101060 back to Hauptbahnhof with EC379 for 112184 to Gesundbrunnen making engine number 28 in the four hour spell in Berlin; and someone told me there wasn’t much to do in Berlin these days! I’d barely stopped since I’ arrived and was ready for a rest let me tell you.

I used the S42, anti-clockwise ring-bahn, to get from Gesundbrunnen to Beusselstrasse, only three stops, and then the TXL bus from there to the airport; the journey only taking approx. 8 minutes. It’s not signposted from the platforms as to which exit to use to get you to the right side of the road for the bus to the airport but it’s the one towards the rear of the train on arrival at Beusselstrasse; I found this out the hard way but was rewarded for missing the first bus by the fact that the next bus didn’t have a working machine to allow the bus driver to sell me a ticket so my journey to the airport was free as a result!

Unfortunately I had to queue up at the airport to get a boarding card as for some reason my British Airways app had lost my list of current flights and I couldn’t access my mobile boarding card as a result; having checked in the previous evening while in Burger King outside Budapest Keleti. The queuing was harmless enough though and there wasn’t a great deal of messing around at all.

The hectic morning had obviously taken it out of me and my head was nodding before we’d even departed Tegel and I can’t remember anything at all about take-off whatsoever! It was a simple flight and thankfully an on time one back at Heathrow; where for the first time ever I managed to get through security using my passport at the chip gates. It had never, ever worked before, and I was withered when the display turned green and the gate opened to let me though, the irony being my passport will be renewed in the new year so I’d have to see if the new one would work from day one.

The Piccadilly line was wedged into central London and the Victoria line from Green Park to Euston even more so. Thankfully though they were both efficient enough to get me to Euston for the 1943 Euston – Preston to Milton Keynes; where I’d be returning to work on nights the following night for a rest……..

The Moves

Gen for Monday 18^th August 2014

Diagrams by Day as per Summer 2014 diagrams

Rostock 112’s

112102 – Day 1, 114040 – Day 2, 112101 – Day 3, 112114 – Day 5

Cottbus 112’s

112105 – BA1, 112185 – BA2, 112133 – BA3, 112190 – BA6, 112116 – BA7, 112184 – BA8, 112110 – BB1, 114003 – BB2, 112122 – BB4, 112109 – BD1 (pm), 112109 – BD2 (am), 112119 – BD3, 112118 – BD4, 112123 – BD5

Magdeburg – Frankfurt circuit

182004, 006, 012, 013 plus 112117 & 143848

Additional

143065 & 143210 out on Berlin Ost – Berlin Zoo shuttles

143931 18912 1027 Berlin Flughafen – Nauen vice EMU

The Photos