Interrail 2020 summary

by bretzelitos

Again… what a trip!

The 15 days of travelling through Europe went by quicker than we were able to recognize. And this time, with a bit less ambitious schedule and more time to see all these visited cities, it was much more quiet and less hectic than in 2018.

We have really seen a lot and learnt about places, persons and surroundings. Pieces of information that we did not have in our mind before – and impressions that we will never forget.

The trains were absolutely perfect this time. None of them left our planned start train station with a single minute of delay. And only once, we had a 35 minutes arrival delay. However, it needs to be noted: The trains were fairly empty, sometimes we were the only people in our coach or booking class. We need to underline that the amount of tourists we have seen during the trip in the trains was fairly low as well. I guess mainly due to the complete absence of citizens from outside of Europe.

Now to the questions and two answers each:

  • What was the best hotel room?
    • Maritim Hotel in Dresden – what a room!
    • aDLERS Hotel in Innsbruck – what a view!
  • Where was the best hotel breakfast?
    • Hilton in Vienna – mentioned twice!
  • Where was the best evening restaurant?
    • Sophienkeller in Dresden
    • Weitblick Restaurant in Innsbruck
  • What was the best train food?
    • DoN in ÖBB Railjet
    • Leberkäse with Austrian wine
  • What was the best bar?
    • Irish Pub in Berlin
    • Avalon Project in Vienna
  • What was the best train product?
    • Railjet ÖBB Business Class – mentioned twice!
  • What was the best tourist option in the train?
    • Panorama Coach SBB in the Eurocity Transalpin – mentioned twice!
  • Where was the best tourist option we took unplanned?
    • Horse carriage ride with Viakerei Süss in Salzburg
    • Alpha Romeo Spider tour through Prague
  • What was the most remarkable discovery?
    • The astronomic tower in Prague
    • Salzburg as city
  • What were the most interesting places seen during the trip (multiple answers possible)?
    • Hamburg Harbour
    • International Maritime Museum in Hamburg
    • Sanssouci Park in Potsdam
    • Monument for Sinti and Roma in Berlin
    • Semper Opera in Dresden
    • Clementinum in Prague
    • Beer garden U Fleku in Prague
    • Hofbräuhaus in München
    • Burg Hohensalzburg in Salzburg
    • Museum Albertina in Vienna
    • Crossing the Alps in a Panorama Coach
    • The Alpine lakes
    • Swimming in Lake Zurich
    • Gay bar in Zurich opposite of our hotel
  • Where did we get the best local transport options?
    • Hamburg – a full public transport network card included in the hotel room price!
    • Berlin – a full public transport network card included in the hotel room price!
  • Where did we get the best price/value option in a hotel?
    • Maritim Hotel in Dresden – mentioned twice!
  • Fastest velocity during the trip:
    • Paris – Forbach by TGV doing 320 kmh or 200mph

As last point I would like to give some advice out of our experience to our fellow INTERRAILers, no matter of which age and which origin:

  • Travelling alone and travelling with two or more people by INTERRAIL is a complete different experience
  • It is good to have a planned schedule ahead. Train and hotel reservations are a great help. Thank you, booking.com, for being a marvellous, easy and trustworthy travel companion with fair hotel prices with 1-day-in-advance cancellation policies during these difficult travel times
  • Have your different travel apps on your mobile devices up-to-date. Advisable to have in our trip were
    • INTERRAIL Rail Planner
    • Deutsche Bahn
    • Ceske Drahy
    • ÖBB
    • Booking.com
    • Several different national and international news portals to check upon the latest CoVid-19 travel restrictions information
  • Some trains require additional reservations for quite a substantial fee. These reservations need to be printed and carried along. Attention: they are only valid for that mentioned train and cannot be easily transferred to another one. Better be on-time when using such a train, otherwise it might be quite a hassle
  • Have redundancy for face masks and desinfection alcoholic gels while travelling
  • Keep your travel documents with you and safe at all times

I would like to thank all of you following or commenting about our travel blog over the last 20 days. It has been an experience that needs to be done again, that is absolutely for sure.

KEEP SAFE AND HEALTHY at all times! See you next time!