I live in Berlin and we’ve made an effort in recent years to use more trains over planes.
Unfortunately, Deutsche Bahn and the German rail network are utterly shite, which means that just about every journey has gone wrong in some weird way or other. I’m so done with it at this point.
Strangely, the journeys we’ve had on British trains have gone much better, but that might just be because we were on off-peak services combined with a modicum of luck.
Journeys from Berlin (and back) include:
Amsterdam / Utrecht
Copenhagen
Paris
Venice (via Munich)
Vienna (overnight Nightjet)
Garmisch (full of skiers)
We mostly travel with a Supersaver 1st class ticket, plus 10 euros for cancellation insurance. It’s often remarkably cheap if you choose well - my return Berlin-Venice was 150 euros 1st class.
I’ve heard so many bad things about the European Sleeper that we refuse to do it. I want it to work as an idea, but I also want to have functional loos on a long journey.
But DB also shows real creativity in ballsing up a journey:
Common or garden delayed trains which means missing connecting services. It’s rare for a train to arrive on time.
The dreaded words ‘die Zugbindung ist aufgehoben’ means that all your seat reservations then get cancelled too.
Rude staff (who are admittedly under huge pressure): last year from Paris our reservations had been cancelled and DH and I could only find seats 5 rows apart. At least we had that much - other people had to stand. Conductor comes to check tickets, DH and I have a shared ticket so I say ‘this is also for my husband back there, we couldn’t find seats closer together’ by way of explanation, definitely not a complaint. She snaps back ‘count yourself lucky you’re sitting at all’ in a really aggressive tone.
A pretty unpleasant confrontation between passengers on the packed skiing train when one person shifted someone else’s luggage on the overhead rack to accommodate his own suitcase and the owner threatened to file a police complaint. Nearly came to fisticuffs. Not DB’s fault directly, but definitely the consequence of selling more tickets than the train could comfortably accommodate.
Announcing a change of platform 2 minutes before the train arrives, while warning passengers to hurry up because the train won’t wait for them. Not great for those with mobility issues.
Half of the train carriages were missing. My reservation was in the missing half, leaving me searching for a seat. Again.
Two separate trains coupled together, with no access between the two - and it was an express train with no stops for 90 minutes. The electronic display showed the two sections back to front, creating utter chaos when the train actually came in. Once more, I couldn’t use my reserved seat because I couldn’t get to the other section. When I asked the conductor if I should just use any unreserved seat he launched into a long rant about 30 years of underfunding for the railways. Which may well be true, but I’m not his therapist.
Utterly filthy train (and I got on at the first station on the line).
Strike made it impossible to travel for 24 hours - that one is on Trenitalia. Had to stay an extra night in Venice sadly.
If you have notifications switched on for the DB app they will send you multiple real-time updates throughout the journey: your 14:21 arrival is now due at 14:22, oops no now it’s 14:20, and then back to 14:21. They mean well but it’s just annoying.
The catering service will invariably be missing something really basic, like hot water. No sign will be displayed about this so you only find out when you get to the head of the queue.
Train from Amsterdam to Berlin departs with a huge delay. Dutch crew in the Netherlands exchanged for German crew at the border. Each conductor uses every single announcement to point out that the delay is due to the other country. It was hilariously infantile.
DD going from Berlin to Utrecht. Along the way passengers are told the last section of the track before the border is closed for repairs and they’ll have a rail replacement bus to the border. The buses just don’t turn up. After two hours an employee tells people to take taxis in groups and claim the money back from DB. DB later refuses to pay all the taxi fare because it claims the buses did come. An absolute shitshow - DD missed the event she was going there for.
The weirdest and most controversial one, which is arguably not DB’s fault: an incredibly smelly young guy got on, it was in a small 6-person carriage rather than an open one so the smell was really horrific, but localised. Again I gave up my reserved seat and went to find an empty one elsewhere. I can’t imagine he would have been permitted to fly if this had been a plane. I think the conductor should have intervened TBH. This was way beyond a bit of BO.
Some of those situations are pretty minor, and not all of them were caused by DB. But overall it just means that I associate trains with things going wrong in a way that isn’t so common with planes. At least with planes you get 250 euros compensation rather than a limited 10 euro voucher for delays. I want to like trains, but they absolutely need to be a nicer experience.