Baltic Adventure by Land, Sea and Air, 1

London, Bremen, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Riga, Tallinn, Helsinki, Lübeck, Cologne

Part 1, through Belgium and Germany to Denmark

This tour of Scandinavian and Baltic countries was planned as a birthday treat for my wife's next round birthday and we were able to time it so that we would be away on the actual day. This had an advantage when going to northern Europe in that it would be likely to be warm enough, since the big day is close to midsummer day. The Great Rail Journeys rail tour  "Highlights of Scandinavia and the Baltics" nicely fitted what she wanted to do and was available at just the right timing, so we booked it up as soon as we discovered it, well in advance, and worked all out other plans round it.

Many other trips small and large were taken between booking this one and starting the adventure!

Trains and Boats and Planes

There are no trains out of Stamford on a Sunday morning but this suited us well on this occasion: as I am to be missing from church for two Sundays while touring, it was as well to be able to take the Sunday service at St Martin's before I left. We had a light lunch, washed up and walked down to the station for our booked train and connected at Peterborough for a train to London, travelling in First Class, booked well in advance.

As usual, soon after leaving Peterborough the cold drinks trolley came through and we chose rosé wine, excellent for such a hot day and we thought it would go well with our chosen food but alas the food had run out, but for crisps and biscuits. Not a disaster but an annoyance: we were meeting our son in London for a drink and would just add some food to the plan. Having checked in at the Premier Inn at Kings Cross we met at Mare Street Food, in the beautifully-redeveloped Kings Cross area.

On Monday morning our Great Rail Journeys tour began as we met our Tour Manager Martyn outside the GRJ office at St Pancras station and then made our way to the ticket barriers in the International Departures area. There was an unprecedented queue! usually we just walk in, wth an occasional brief wait, but this time the queue started right back by the lifts to the Southeastern Highspeed platforms. Although it was a long queue it was fast and it was not all that long a time before we were scanning our tickets and going through to await boarding. Security and passport check were swift and efficient. I was expecting to buy coffee at The Station Pantry as usual only to find that it was closed and behind hoardings, being redeveloped into another type of establishment. So we finished up at Prêt-à-Manger which was perfectly fine. Just time to drink our coffee before the train started loading and we went up the travellator to find our coach and our pair of facing single seats, our favourite accommodation on Eurostar and on any other train that offers it. As usual, a light breakfast was served on the train, and as often on Great Rail Journeys we met some of our fellow travellers who were sitting at the four-seat table opposite ours.

The Eurostar train arrived at Brussels on time and then began a long catalogue of delays. We had time to have lunch at Brussels and already knew that our connecting service to Cologne was running late.

We were scheduled to catch the 17:11 train from Cologne to Bremen and there was still plenty of time to make the connection, but it was indicated as expected at 17:58 and with no catering. As time passed it became later and later until it finally left Cologne at 19:00, nearly two hours late. This is, I'm sorry to say, the sort of service we have come to expect from DB. Our Tour Manager telephoned ahead to our hotel who kindly held ack our buffet dinner until we arrived. It was a pity that we should not have a chance to see much at all of Bremen: thanks to further delays to our train we had to go straight into dinner and did not get to bed until midnight.

On a bright and sunny Tuesday morning we walked back to Bremen station for the ICE to Hamburg. This one did have its catering offering but was a few minutes late then held before arriving at Hamburg Hbf, but was still in good time to make our connection to Copenhagen. The coffee was good but we had to pay cash, which is unusual these days; to our surprise, the train to Copenhagen was from Prague and was a Czech train with a Czech crew. Having crossed Germany it was, of course, late, although only be ten minutes. This eventually became twenty minutes before it actually departed. We were travelling in Second Class on this train, but this was still comfortable and pleasant. We did think of having a hot meal in the restaurant car, but when we went all the tables were taken and there were few of the cooked items left, so we bought sandwiches and took them back to our seats. The first highlight of this section of the journey was crossing the Kiel Canal on the Rendsburg High Bridge. This is high enough to allow ships to pass beneath, and have crossed the train then descends on a wide spiral to pass under the bridge and continue on its way along the opposite bank of the canal. This is all in a wooded residential area which looks great from the railway, although how great the railway looks from the homes I cannot say!

After crossing the other highlight of this journey, the Great Belt crossing, there was a total change of mood after a Danish crew took over at a subsequent stop. The driver spoke to us and told us he was going to to his best to regain lost time, there was a ticket check and a rubbish collection and everyone was asked to get their luggage out of the aisles, there was an announcement about the bistro (it was not restocked, though and the Czech steward remained). Unfortunately a Signal fault caused further delay and lost a few minutes more than our Danish driver had been able to recover.  We arrived in Copenhagen just in time to walk to our hotel, the Scandic Palace in the main square, drop our luggage in our room and then walk to our meal out at the restaurant Flammen for a traditional buffet dinner.  It was very much a carvery where we were served with our choice if meat (I had wild boar) and helped ourselves to the vegetables. 

We had arrived in Scandinavia, the first of a series of capital cities. We had been in Copenhagen before, on a day out from Billund when we brought our children there for Legoland over thirty years ago! We recognised only the royal palace. Back in those days we had to fly to Copenhagen, but now were able to get there by rail via the Great Belt bridge and tunnel. Our activities in Copenhagen and subsequent adventures in Stockholm, Riga, Tallinn and Helsinki will follow soon in the next post or two ....