Today was not a good day for Deutsche Bahn, so a regular patron of the service told me on the train to Cologne. Visiting Cologne was never on our Itinerary!
The day started off OK with the local train from Strasbourg to Offenburg arriving and departing on time. The next train to Frankfurt Flughafen (Frankfurt Airport) was good too. I’d booked couple of seats last night, even though it was not mandatory, just to be sure the ICE 200 was still running. It too arrived and left on time. We didn’t even need to change platform. The 1hr40m journey was only a little late bit we still had plenty of time to catch the ICE 314 direct to Brussels. As we alighted I caught out of the corner of my eye on the display screen in the carriage a line ruled through the ICE 314. Of dear, I thought, I wonder what that means, knowing full well what it meant. On the platform I found a DB employee who confirmed that our train to Brussels had been cancelled! He directed us to the Service Desk upstairs where a colleague of his re-confirmed our situation and had the wherewithal to be quickly searching on her handheld computer for alternatives. It seemed the only way we were going to get to Brussels today was via Cologne. What a shame because the train we’d just got off went on to Hamburg, via Cologne.
When the ICE 610 to Cologne arrived we just jumped on and worried about tickets and mandatory seat reservations later if we had to. The first 20 minutes was spent standing in the luggage area as no seats were available. There were plenty of others in the same predicament. A helpful DB staff member came along to advise that Carriage 5 had plenty of seats available so off we went. Before we got there Kerry spied a couple of likely empty seats which turned out to be the case so we finished the journey to Cologne in comfort. The girl back at Frankfurt suggested we visit the Service Desk once we got to Cologne to get our reserved seats changed. With a bit of on the fly translation logic applied and Kerry’s eagle-eye we found the Service Desk in the very, very busy Cologne station and joined the queue. When we eventually got inside the office we heard a staff member call out “Brussels?!”. Furiously waving our hands we were ushered to the top of the queue where another very helpful DB girl reserved a seat for us on the 15:40 train (ICE 14) to Brussels-Midi. Hooray! It’s all working out. We’ll get to Brussels after all.
Not so fast, mister! My DB Navigator app told me the train was leaving for Platform 5 so off we trotted to find the electronic signs declaring exactly that. We still had a good 40 minutes until departure. Then 45 minutes. Then 50 minutes. Then 55 minutes. The train got to 17 minutes late and got no later. That’s good. What’s 17 minutes between friends? So we sat and waited. A train pulled in to Platform 5 bound for somewhere else and waited for it’s departure time which cam and went and still it sat there. It had better move because our train was due soon – the electronic board still said so. Discussions were being held outside the door of the train immediately in front of us between passengers and a conductor. Some got on while others walked away. All pretty normal stuff. Then in a hurried fashion, along came another concerned looking conductor, “Brussels! Brussels! Is anyone going to Brussels?!” I jumped up and declared that we were and he said “Get on the train! This is now your train!” So, quick as a flash we jumped on the train through the closest doorway and a minute later it rolled away. After pushing our case down the length of five moving carriages we finally settled in the seats allocated to us, the number of our carriage having been hastily scrawled in chalk above the entrance door.
Almost in disbelief the train pulled into Brussels-Midi about 1hr15min later, clocking speeds of up to 250kph along the journey. Brussels-Midi is a pretty scungey station so we got out of there to our overnight stay just a few hundred metres away which is actually quite nice. The manager directed us to an area about 30 minutes google-walk away declaring that there was nothing available on premises or in the neighbourhood. To the contrary, Google told me that there was a Pakistani restaurant just around the corner. So we went there. It was a delightful, simple little shop with a great array of dishes to select from from in a bain-marie. The shop had plenty of tables so we elected to dine at the cafe. Being a Pakistani restaurant to our great delight a T20 World Cup cricket match was playing on the big TV. So, we got to enjoy great Pakistani food while watching the second half of Pakistan’s innings against the USA being played in Texas, of all places, in a restaurant in Brussels!
Two Australians started the day in France, spent most of it travelling through Germany and finished in Belgium eating in a Pakistani restaurant watching the USA play cricket in Texas. Now's there's a multi-cultural end to a long and challenging day for you!
Interesting (and frustrating) travel challenges, but good on you for taking it your stride and finding suitable solutions to your problems - your IT Management and Project Management served you well. Hope your trip to Manchester was less eventful. BTW, this days blog I think should be day 55 based on previous blog entries.
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