Asha and Rüdiger have since headed off to Rügen, leaving us their home for a few days. All of Germany is currently suffering from a heat wave. All of Germany? No—a small island way up in the north is defying climate change and staying cool, just as we Southerners keep accusing Northerners of doing. The hats and caps you can buy up here say “Schietwedder” on them. But you really can’t call the current weather "Schietwedder". On the contrary, the sun is shining, there isn’t a cloud in the sky, and the wind is relatively light for this region. So, perfect conditions for Sylt and probably the best weather you can get on this island. While the rest of the country is sweating in nearly 40°C heat, the thermometer on Sylt is barely touching 20°C. It’s sock weather, then, and I, for one, am drawn to the warmth.
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| Beach near List on Sylt, Germany |
On Wednesday, we’re heading south again. It turns out to be a particularly inopportune day, though we don’t realize it until later in the day. Just before five in the morning, everything is still fine. We board the first bus, which takes us from List to the train station in Westerland. The Regio-Express, scheduled for 6:19 a.m. and bound for Hamburg Altona from Westerland, is canceled due to a faulty switch. Miraculously, it’s working again an hour later. By the way: The car-carrying train, which departed at roughly the same time as the Regio-Express and uses the same switch, leaves Westerland on schedule. Oh well, whatever. In Elmshorn, we have to transfer because we need to get to Hamburg Central Station to catch our connecting train to Bremen, which is supposed to take us to Buchholz. Unfortunately, the train isn’t stopping at either Hamburg Dammtor or the main station today—it’s heading straight to Hamburg-Altona. So we might as well have stayed on the train in Elmshorn. We struggle our way through the crowds stranded in Hamburg-Altona, taking the S-Bahn back to Hamburg Central Station. With a 25-minute layover, the train we were planning to take is, of course, already gone, so we wait for the next one. By now, it’s already 10°C warmer in Hamburg than it was on Sylt. Six and a half hours after leaving Sylt, we finally leave Hamburg and head to Buchholz.
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| Port of Hamburg, Germany |
In Buchholz, we manage to grab a coffee to go at the kiosk as we walk by—our only chance that day. We board the regional train to Hanover. The trip, which was supposed to take just under two hours, ends up taking 2.5 hours, leaving us with only 7 minutes to transfer in Hanover instead of 37. The Regio-Express takes us to Göttingen in two hours. There, we learn that the Regio-Express to Gera—which is supposed to take us to Neudietendorf—has been canceled or, rather, will only run from Gotha onward. The reason: a quality improvement initiative by Deutsche Bahn on this section of the route. Tears well up in my eyes. I just don’t know exactly why.
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| Gänseliesel Fountain, Göttingen, Germany |
We take the regional train from Göttingen to Eichenberg again and transfer to the Regio-Express there. The whole process takes us another two hours, so we miss the Regio-Express to Würzburg. Instead, we continue on the regional train to Grimmenthal and from there to Schweinfurt. The transfer times are just a few minutes. After Schweinfurt, we arrive in Würzburg at 9:29 p.m. on Track 10. Departure for Stuttgart is at 9:37 p.m. on Track 2. We arrive at Stuttgart Central Station at 11:57 p.m. We rush through the construction zone to catch the light rail, which departs at 12:06 a.m. By 12:18 a.m., we’ve finally made it. The Deutsche Bahn adventure is over. After 19.5 hours, we’ve crossed the country from its northernmost tip all the way to the far south. An adventure that can only be expected of the seasoned traveler with several years of international experience traveling by public transit. If you don’t have that kind of experience, buy an ICE ticket. That doesn’t mean you’ll actually arrive at your intended destination on Deutsche Bahn, but it does have the advantage that, while you’ll have to overcome the hurdle of the paperwork, you’ll at least have a chance to get some of your costs reimbursed afterward. For everyone else, take a plane or drive your own car. Even with the risk of traffic jams in and around Hamburg, you’ll get there faster than by train. Plus, you can stop along the way to grab something to eat. At least on regional trains, you end up rushing from one platform to another because the trains are rarely on time. Oh, and by the way, as part of its quality initiative, the railway actually manages to run the air conditioning in one out of every six cars. The other five cars rely on forced ventilation through the skylights at the front and back of the car. It’s cozy and warm in there—especially when the train is once again stuck on the tracks, waiting for an oncoming train to pass. After all, Deutsche Bahn also wants to become climate-neutral by—who knows when. Later, we learn that Deutsche Bahn’s radio network had gone down across Germany, and no trains were running for an extended period. That at least explains the huge crowds at the stations. But it also highlights Deutsche Bahn’s dilapidated infrastructure, which is also evident at the many abandoned stations you pass on a trip like this. We’re already looking forward to our next adventure with Deutsche Bahn. Until then, always fair winds, and keep a stiff upper lip.
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