Birdbrain
Member
- Joined
- 16 Jun 2007
- Messages
- 398
Hello,
I have been deliberating for quite a while as to whether to write this trip report and have decided to write it now having some time off in the Easter break. Hopefully some of you will enjoy reading it and hopefully it will help you with some of your own trip planning to Europe. My girlfriend and I took this trip between 29th July and 30th August 2015 using Interrail passes. We thought of the idea of travelling around Europe after Christmas and started planning, booking Hostels and seat reservations immediately. We planned our itinerary to include countries we had not previously visited, avoiding Germany , France and Denmark and using the whole months validity of the ticket to travel as far away as possible with a flight back. We got out small amounts of each currency we needed from our local post office but mainly used a Caxton FX card to pay on the go. I would defiantly recommend this if planning a long trip away as there are no transaction fees. If you have any other questions about the planning and logistics of the trip then Id be happy to answer them on this thread. I will write this report mainly from a rail enthusiasts point of view but also mention some touristic parts that might be of interest. We took the trip not only for the rail but also to visit these new places so we didnt work the tickets as hard as if you were doing a month of pure rail bashing! I think thats all the background we need so lets get straight to day 1!
Day 1 Brading-Harwich
We had booked to sail on the overnight Harwich-Hoek Van Holland ferry as part of the rail sail deal and started our interrail passes from Amsterdam a few days later for maximum use. We awoke in the morning very excited for our adventure and spent the morning packing our bags and making sure we had all of the money, cards, and travel essentials for a trip like this. We took a 60L backpack each and a small backpack to use in the daytimes. We had padlocks for each as we were staying in some Hostels enroute. We made our way down to our local station, Brading on the Isle of Wight for our first rail move of the holiday, the short ten minute ride to the Isle of Wight ferry aboard the 1938 Ex London Transport stock. At Ryde Pier Head we made the quick transfer onto the Wight Ryder Catamaran and were soon making our way across the Solent to Portsmouth Harbour. At this point it had still not fully set in that we were embarking on such a huge trip not to return to our Island home for over a month. On arrival at Portsmouth we made the 4 minute connection to the Southern service to London Victoria. We often choose this route to London because of the bargain fares when compared with SWT to Waterloo. I had in fact brought outbound day travel cards as this was the cheapest way to include the tube. A rather uneventful two hours passed although I do like the scenery through the Arun Valley, and soon we had passes Clapham and were on the approaches to London Victoria. Limited luggage space on the 377 units meant I had stuffed our rucksacks inbetween seats so we waited for the crowds to die down before disembarking. We had only taken a little bit of English cash with us as we would soon leave the country so we headed across to Liverpool street via the Circle line and spent some time sat outside McDonalds with a Big Tasty- Lovely. In our quest for Loco Haulage, I decided to take a Norwich bound service from Liverpool Street as far as Maningtree for a change onto the unit for the Harwich Branch. 90007 was in charge for this leg and we found some unreserved seats near the front. Changing at Maningtree we headed along the Harwich branch, the first bit of new track on the holiday for me. I had been to Harwich before when using the now departed DFDS route to Esjburg but this was by coach. Soon the Stenna Holandica came into view as we alighted at the old Parkestone Quay terminus. The whole passenger terminal looked to be a shadow of its former self with the café closed and only one desk open for passengers. The route onto the ferry was fairly speedy although the works with the linkspan meant that we used the bus to transfer onto the ship. We checked into our outside 2 berth cabin (we had previously travelled on DFDS in a 6 berth inside so made a wiser choice this time!) and explored the ship. I must say how impressive it was. Large public open spaces, café, shops, cinema, bar. I think it is the largest passenger ferry afloat? After a cup of tea we headed back to our cabin for a good nights sleep as we werent sure about the sleep quality we would get in the hostels for the next few nights. After a while I was woken up by the vibrating of the ladder in the cabin meaning we had left port, a few hours late because of the crisis being played out in Calais. Day 2 to follow in the next post shortly.
I have been deliberating for quite a while as to whether to write this trip report and have decided to write it now having some time off in the Easter break. Hopefully some of you will enjoy reading it and hopefully it will help you with some of your own trip planning to Europe. My girlfriend and I took this trip between 29th July and 30th August 2015 using Interrail passes. We thought of the idea of travelling around Europe after Christmas and started planning, booking Hostels and seat reservations immediately. We planned our itinerary to include countries we had not previously visited, avoiding Germany , France and Denmark and using the whole months validity of the ticket to travel as far away as possible with a flight back. We got out small amounts of each currency we needed from our local post office but mainly used a Caxton FX card to pay on the go. I would defiantly recommend this if planning a long trip away as there are no transaction fees. If you have any other questions about the planning and logistics of the trip then Id be happy to answer them on this thread. I will write this report mainly from a rail enthusiasts point of view but also mention some touristic parts that might be of interest. We took the trip not only for the rail but also to visit these new places so we didnt work the tickets as hard as if you were doing a month of pure rail bashing! I think thats all the background we need so lets get straight to day 1!
Day 1 Brading-Harwich
We had booked to sail on the overnight Harwich-Hoek Van Holland ferry as part of the rail sail deal and started our interrail passes from Amsterdam a few days later for maximum use. We awoke in the morning very excited for our adventure and spent the morning packing our bags and making sure we had all of the money, cards, and travel essentials for a trip like this. We took a 60L backpack each and a small backpack to use in the daytimes. We had padlocks for each as we were staying in some Hostels enroute. We made our way down to our local station, Brading on the Isle of Wight for our first rail move of the holiday, the short ten minute ride to the Isle of Wight ferry aboard the 1938 Ex London Transport stock. At Ryde Pier Head we made the quick transfer onto the Wight Ryder Catamaran and were soon making our way across the Solent to Portsmouth Harbour. At this point it had still not fully set in that we were embarking on such a huge trip not to return to our Island home for over a month. On arrival at Portsmouth we made the 4 minute connection to the Southern service to London Victoria. We often choose this route to London because of the bargain fares when compared with SWT to Waterloo. I had in fact brought outbound day travel cards as this was the cheapest way to include the tube. A rather uneventful two hours passed although I do like the scenery through the Arun Valley, and soon we had passes Clapham and were on the approaches to London Victoria. Limited luggage space on the 377 units meant I had stuffed our rucksacks inbetween seats so we waited for the crowds to die down before disembarking. We had only taken a little bit of English cash with us as we would soon leave the country so we headed across to Liverpool street via the Circle line and spent some time sat outside McDonalds with a Big Tasty- Lovely. In our quest for Loco Haulage, I decided to take a Norwich bound service from Liverpool Street as far as Maningtree for a change onto the unit for the Harwich Branch. 90007 was in charge for this leg and we found some unreserved seats near the front. Changing at Maningtree we headed along the Harwich branch, the first bit of new track on the holiday for me. I had been to Harwich before when using the now departed DFDS route to Esjburg but this was by coach. Soon the Stenna Holandica came into view as we alighted at the old Parkestone Quay terminus. The whole passenger terminal looked to be a shadow of its former self with the café closed and only one desk open for passengers. The route onto the ferry was fairly speedy although the works with the linkspan meant that we used the bus to transfer onto the ship. We checked into our outside 2 berth cabin (we had previously travelled on DFDS in a 6 berth inside so made a wiser choice this time!) and explored the ship. I must say how impressive it was. Large public open spaces, café, shops, cinema, bar. I think it is the largest passenger ferry afloat? After a cup of tea we headed back to our cabin for a good nights sleep as we werent sure about the sleep quality we would get in the hostels for the next few nights. After a while I was woken up by the vibrating of the ladder in the cabin meaning we had left port, a few hours late because of the crisis being played out in Calais. Day 2 to follow in the next post shortly.