I enjoyed your trip Gerard, some great photos.
Just having a single malt myself.
Sláinte
Another European odyssey....!
- Thread starter gerarddwatts
- Start date
Just having a single malt myself.
Sláinte
That was great Gerard 
- Prague is my favourite city; been there many times.
You mentioned Heydrich a few posts back. The church on Resslova Street, where the commandos were killed, is worth a visit for anyone who is interested.
I've also been to the memorial at Arisaig you mentioned to complete my journey on the Third Reich Tour.
- Prague is my favourite city; been there many times.You mentioned Heydrich a few posts back. The church on Resslova Street, where the commandos were killed, is worth a visit for anyone who is interested.
I've also been to the memorial at Arisaig you mentioned to complete my journey on the Third Reich Tour.
A great trip and all transport plans worked!
Reassuring after the Vienna trip last year when the German Railway system did every thing they could to bugger it up!
The European Sleeper worked well, but the cabins are a work in progress..no water in the wash basin either way, but you just need to brush your teeth and the bottled water they give you does that. A packet of baby wipes does the job to freshen up!
The charging points are shite...I relied on a portable power pack, such as the one Wapping has for sale right now, and you are reliant on 'shore side' wifi.
The best sleeper I have been on remains the Caledonian Sleeper from London going up. European sleeper trains are going through a bit of a renaissance but both the current operators..Nightjet(Austrian Railways OBB) and European Sleepers(a Belgian start up company) are using pretty old and tired stock, built in the 50's and rebuilt in the 90's.
Sleeper trains lost favour but are now re-emerging as a leisurely green(?) way to travel about the continent; the coaches are a very expensive investment.
As ever, the website..
https://www.seat61.com/index-mobile.htm
is a very useful asset to plan such trips, even offering, for example, step by step guidance to transfer between Gare du Nord and Gare du Lyon, or suggesting ways to avoid going through Paris at all.
I know we would all prefer to do this sort of trip on a bike, as I have done for years, but needs must, and this sort of trip allows a bit of the 'adventure', and exploring 'foreign' without 'following the herd'.
Talking of herds, Prague was busy, and this was March....don't go in mid or high season if you value your sanity! Still very good value, in 'western' terms if you are canny about the hot spots, same as Venice for example. Lots to see and mostly walkable.
They have realised that the reputation they were developing as a stag/hens night pissup spot was not for the best, and pub crawls are illegal now, beer bikes and such are banned, outside drinking is banned in lots of places; it seemed to be quite civilised at night!.
I'm not a lager drinker but the Pilsener Urquell was very acceptable!
However, the crowds are only going to get worse!
I think they had to promise to use the Euro at some point in the future to their EU masters in Brussels, but are showing few signs of relinquishing the koruna..good for them! They take euros in some places in the city but why bother? Use your card or get some crowns....we bought most of ours back and I only got a couple of hundred quid worth.
Do be careful using cash machines...some offer shite exchange rates.
There are some really helpful you-tube guides to Prague visitors....do a bit of research!
Reassuring after the Vienna trip last year when the German Railway system did every thing they could to bugger it up!
The European Sleeper worked well, but the cabins are a work in progress..no water in the wash basin either way, but you just need to brush your teeth and the bottled water they give you does that. A packet of baby wipes does the job to freshen up!
The charging points are shite...I relied on a portable power pack, such as the one Wapping has for sale right now, and you are reliant on 'shore side' wifi.
The best sleeper I have been on remains the Caledonian Sleeper from London going up. European sleeper trains are going through a bit of a renaissance but both the current operators..Nightjet(Austrian Railways OBB) and European Sleepers(a Belgian start up company) are using pretty old and tired stock, built in the 50's and rebuilt in the 90's.
Sleeper trains lost favour but are now re-emerging as a leisurely green(?) way to travel about the continent; the coaches are a very expensive investment.
As ever, the website..
https://www.seat61.com/index-mobile.htm
is a very useful asset to plan such trips, even offering, for example, step by step guidance to transfer between Gare du Nord and Gare du Lyon, or suggesting ways to avoid going through Paris at all.
I know we would all prefer to do this sort of trip on a bike, as I have done for years, but needs must, and this sort of trip allows a bit of the 'adventure', and exploring 'foreign' without 'following the herd'.
Talking of herds, Prague was busy, and this was March....don't go in mid or high season if you value your sanity! Still very good value, in 'western' terms if you are canny about the hot spots, same as Venice for example. Lots to see and mostly walkable.
They have realised that the reputation they were developing as a stag/hens night pissup spot was not for the best, and pub crawls are illegal now, beer bikes and such are banned, outside drinking is banned in lots of places; it seemed to be quite civilised at night!.
I'm not a lager drinker but the Pilsener Urquell was very acceptable!
However, the crowds are only going to get worse!
I think they had to promise to use the Euro at some point in the future to their EU masters in Brussels, but are showing few signs of relinquishing the koruna..good for them! They take euros in some places in the city but why bother? Use your card or get some crowns....we bought most of ours back and I only got a couple of hundred quid worth.
Do be careful using cash machines...some offer shite exchange rates.
There are some really helpful you-tube guides to Prague visitors....do a bit of research!
do they give you a choice to be billed in local currency or do they insist on converting to sterling at their rate? Any fees separate to the exchange rate?
I didn't use any so can't give an accurate answer but if you look at some of the you tube guides they suggest that the problem is the exchange rate...particularly Euronet...
Thank you for this write up of your train adventure. We’re going to do a train tour in September and whilst we can still tour on the bike if we want to the train adds a different experience. My wife will no longer fly so it’s either bike, motorhomes or train. The plan so far is to get to Paris from Yorkshire, a few days in Paris then south on the sleeper to Nice area for a week, Lyon by TGV then to Chamonix to visit son’s family before Paris again and then back to Yorkshire.
This is of course all subjects to change just because we can.
This is of course all subjects to change just because we can.
Sounds perfect!
Yorkshire to Paris via Kings X/Eurostar is easy...I'll be interested to see the bit from Paris. If you are staying in Paris time is not an issue so why not just get a day train? 6hrs to Nice? Spend the money on 1st Class, look at the scenery.
as a general rule, using ATM from the high street banks is always preferable than using a third party like Euronet.
Googling suggests it is DCM, dynamic currency conversion, which is offered by ATMs and in shops etc, where the machine operator tries to get you to accept being charged in sterling at their conversion rate. Again, the general rule is to pay in the local currency which should be an option. Your own bank then does the conversion, hopefully at the market rate as you are using a fee free account like Starling.
For ATMs, if there is a separate charge just for using the ATM, they should let you know before you commit. Spain is becoming a fucker for this with some banks charging 8 euros where others do not charge.
We just fancy the sleeper although this is subject to change. I want to go on the TGV at some point so the Paris-Nice bit could very well change to TGV first class. We will probably also have a couple of nights in Lyon on the way up to Chamonix. As you can see it’s all a very loose plan at the moment.
How far in advance did you book your trains? I’m considering using Interail tickets too as they are a pretty good deal if booking 10 days over 2 months. With a further saving because we’re both over 60.
The main part of the journey was on European Sleeper service, so not part of the InterRail set up.
This is dynamically priced, and also only usually 1 coach-10 sleeper compartments...although I saw 2 sleeper carriages on the way back.
I booked it in November last year to ensure a sleeper compartment.
The conditions vary depending on how far in advance you book; booking in advance means you get the most favourable conditions, cancellable, alterable, refundable etc.
Would need to check on SNCF sleeper arrangements...yet again, Mark Smith, the man in seat 61, is your friend!
This is dynamically priced, and also only usually 1 coach-10 sleeper compartments...although I saw 2 sleeper carriages on the way back.
I booked it in November last year to ensure a sleeper compartment.
The conditions vary depending on how far in advance you book; booking in advance means you get the most favourable conditions, cancellable, alterable, refundable etc.
Would need to check on SNCF sleeper arrangements...yet again, Mark Smith, the man in seat 61, is your friend!
In the voice of Harry.H.Corbett...' You Dirty Old Man 'Its the view as she goes up...
It's also a Slovakian delicacy , if you get it somewhere away from the tourist traps it is absolutely delicious !
I enjoyed that Gerry. An excellent read. Cheers
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