Written by - Edmond Rose
(train traveller extraordinaire)
Childhood holidays give us cherished memories. Our family spent two summer holidays over fifty years ago in a small village in Germany’s Black Forest. Taking advantage of a few empty days in early November, I decided to visit the area again.
I wanted to make a trip that would involve interesting journeys as well as time in the wooded hills and valleys of the South West corner of Germany, travelling by train. This was luxury compared with five of my family crushed into a VW campervan.
The obvious itinerary would involve four trains from London via Paris and Strasbourg, taking about seven hours. But the route isn’t scenic and I wanted to enjoy the journey itself, so my plan involved six trains to get there – and eight trains, a metro, a ferry and another train on the way back.
The journey out from London via Brussels, Luxembourg and Strasbourg took me over 11 hours. The train from Brussels to Luxembourg plodded out of the city before heading through a gently autumnal landscape on the edge of the Ardennes. At Luxembourg I met friends during a change of trains for a quick catch up over tea in the station café. Then I headed on through sparsely populated folds of green landscape in France’s Grand Est to reach Strasbourg. Finally, I was on a train making its way around two 180 degree curves to gain height into thickly wooded hills and reach my destination, Triberg.
Three days in Triberg went quickly. I walked a lot, visited Germany’s highest waterfalls and came up close to red squirrels and nutcracker birds, while traversing paths through forests of pines and, in places, older, more varied trees.
I visited the town’s museum of Black Forest life, featuring its famous clock-making industry, colourful local costumes and tableaux of rooms from a more rustic time when woodworking and straw weaving were important parts of everyday life.
One day, I walked 11 miles up and over the hills and down into the cow-filled pastures of the Elz valley to visit Oberprechtal, the village where we stayed all those years ago. I was delighted to find that the inn where I first ate Wiener Schnitzel, the Gasthof Adler, is still in business. Many other hotels and restaurants in the region, however, have closed down as Germany’s holidaymakers opt for flights to the sun instead of wholesome holidays closer to home. In cool November, this isn’t so surprising but the flip side of the decline of tourism is having many of the paths through the forest entirely to oneself.
Don’t expect haute cuisine in the Black Forest, but the hearty meals (generally meaty) are good for walkers. You can also find Black Forest cake here, along with disputed claims about who actually originated it.
After my three active days in Triberg, it was time to head home. I chose to take a route that would include the beautiful 45 minutes along the steep sided Rhine valley between Bingen and Koblenz.
Then from Cologne, it’s an unexciting long stretch into the Netherlands to Schiedam for the final half hour ride by metro to Hook of Holland. There, a huge and comfortable ferry took me smoothly across the North Sea overnight. Finally, the train from Harwich returned me to London at 8.45am, back to a busy world far away from forests, hills and cakes with cherries.
The logistics of the journey - all "the how to's"
Booking trains - You can book tickets for a straightforward journey by train to the Black Forest through a number of outlets such as raileurope.com. For a more complex trip, ticket sellers can work, but to get exactly the itinerary I wanted, I used individual apps (I had tickets on Eurostar, SNCB (Belgium), SNCF Connect (France) and DB Navigator apps).
Planning the journey - The German railway app, DB Navigator, is great for planning for most trains right across Europe, especially as it has optional settings for types of train (for example, you can exclude high speed trains) and for adding a stopover. It can sell tickets for many journeys which include Germany.
Special tips and features - My return journey involved using the stopover feature on DB Navigator to request a 0 minute stopover at Koblenz, which forced the app to choose the route along the Rhine river while selling me one ticket from Triberg to Schiedam Centrum near Rotterdam, where I had to buy a metro ticket to Hoek van Holland Haven. I also got a bargain upgrade to First Class covering the whole journey for just €12.
Stena Line has an excellent Rail and Sail ticket which combines the ferry and the train to London in a very reasonable fare.
Finally, Seat61.com is a great resource for information about train travel in Europe with suggested itineraries for many routes.
Hope you enjoyed the journey!
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