Past European Sleeper Services

[pitdiver]

I have recently been listening to an old radio series, Paul Temple and the Geneva Mystery. This was first broadcast in 1965. In one of the episodes Paul Temple mentions catching a sleeper service from Calais Maritime (I assume) to Geneva. Out of curiosity would this have been actually posssible in the 50s/60s?

 

[eastwestdivide]

Yes, that sort of thing would have been possible then. I've got the tickets from a journey made in 1956 by my late mother in law: from London to Austria via a Boulogne-Basel-Innsbruck sleeper, so I'd guess similar services would be running from Calais too.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Oostende was also a common ferry connection and was one of the first to go. I used the Oostende-Muenchen sleeper in 1998.

 

[30907]

I think Geneva may be novelist's licence, but Calais-Paris-Lausanne-Milan certainly existed for many years.

 

[coppercapped]

Oostende was also a common ferry connection and was one of the first to go. I used the Oostende-Muenchen sleeper in 1998.

I used that train frequently over a period of about 10 years when I worked in Ulm. It was the Tauern Express and ran between Oostende and Split in Yugoslavia. At least the concept of the train did - I don't think any coaches made the whole journey. For example the sleeping cars were attached/detached at Salzburg and the restaurant/buffet car only reached Muenchen from the south, there being no meal service (but there was a trolley) on the overnight section from there on to Oostende.

I used to leave my parents around mid-day on a Sunday and take the boat train from Victoria to Dover which connected with the ferry. This took 3 1/2 to 4 hours to reach Oostende and the night trains would be waiting - the one on the adjacent platform had through coaches to Moskva. At the time very John le Carre...! The Tauern Express reached Ulm around 7.00 so I could walk to work from the station and be there at the start of the German working week at 7.15. Happy days!

 

[Nicholas43]

I think Geneva may be novelist's licence, but Calais-Paris-Lausanne-Milan certainly existed for many years.

Indeed. I used it in 1968. Victoria dep 1430, lovely old school restaurant car for dinner Calais to Gare du Nord, sleeping car Calais to Venezia shunted round the Ceinture to Gare de Lyon and attached to the Direct Orient Express. I alas left at Lausanne, 0700 as I recall. Swiss restaurant car being attached as I waited for connecting train to Genève.

 

[route101]

More recent but Amsterdam to Copenhagen.