Bike-and-train touring

[50sbiker]

""""Left in the 1980s. I grew up seeing bomb damage all.""""......ROFL....pity ...you missed a treat...To this day i use my mountain bike daily to avoid Bomb craters around Durham and Newcastle

[mattheus]

All in all a great trip. I could not fly because my battery was 17Ah but not a problem on the trains.

Oooh, I hadn't thought about the Batteries-on-a-Plane issue!


Perhaps we'll get a few more cyclists on the anti-flying side ... : )

[sebdickson]

I've done it twice through Belgium, to allow me to get further into Germany on a round trip tour.

Ferry to Calais/Dunkerque, cycle to Ostende across the border, then hop on the train. There is a 5e supplement for a bike, with an absolutely cavernous area on the lower deck of a carriage to store the bike. For people under 26 and over 65 SNCB does a flat fee from anywhere to anywhere for 6.60e, but its pretty reasonable standard fares as well

I did Ostende-Antwerp on the way out, looped round in Netherlands and Germany for a fortnight and caught the train Liege-Ostende on the way back. This gained me about 400km.

Before anyone calls me out, Belgium is a lovely place to ride a bike, with lovely towns, a spectacular bike network and considerate drivers, I just had toured and cycled in it quite a few times before and wanted to see somewhere new!

[mjr]

Ferry to Calais/Dunkerque, cycle to Ostende across the border, then hop on the train. There is a 5e supplement for a bike, with an absolutely cavernous area on the lower deck of a carriage to store the bike. For people under 26 and over 65 SNCB does a flat fee from anywhere to anywhere for 6.60e, but its pretty reasonable standard fares as well

Yes, quite a lot of discount options too. De Panne station is nearer the border than Ostende and now connected by cycleways and 20mph streets to the town nearest Dunkerque port (Loon-Plage), but trains go mainly to Antwerp so change in Gent for most other places. Dunkerque port to Loon-Plage is annoying, or you can wait for the lorries to go past and then take the more direct motorway feeder road - I'm unsure which is quicker or easier.

SNCB are wonderful. On the UK side, Southeastern are mostly OK (six bike spaces per train no reservations to St Pancras, bikes in doorways on slower trains to Victoria or Charing Cross) but unable to cope with peak bike ferry traffic like bank holiday evenings.

[Cowsham]

Is there a restriction to travelling on the train with your bike before 9.30am on the mainland? We have it here in NI and it's a curse.

[Oldjohnw]

Is there a restriction to travelling on the train with your bike before 9.30am on the mainland? We have it here in NI and it's a curse.

I imagine it depends. Trains from my nearest station, Berwick upon Tweed, have no restrictions (apart from price). I've travelled from 6.30am onwards.

[mercalia]

Is there a restriction to travelling on the train with your bike before 9.30am on the mainland? We have it here in NI and it's a curse.

maybe entering cities during the rush hour eg London. Or leaving during the rush hour 4.40pm - 7pm

[MrsHJ]

Has anyone tried to use an interrail pass and get a bike booked on a TGV or ICE train? I’m just wondering about the logistics of working the bike booking part and using the interrail pass at the same time. At €194 for 4 days in a month it’s potentially fair value to get to central or southern Europe and back. You’d have to link it to a ferry journey though given Eurostar restrictions.

Fun contemplation of what I might do if I get a chance for a second tour late summer.

[bohrsatom]

Has anyone tried to use an interrail pass and get a bike booked on a TGV or ICE train?

Hi MrsHJ

I think this might be possible, but tricky. The Eurail/Interrail seat booking system doesn't offer a bike option, and I'm 99% sure you can't book a bike space online direct with SNCF/DB without also buying an accompanying TGV/ICE train ticket. You would likely have to call each train company direct to make a bike+seat reservation, but (at least in France) you'll be at the mercy of their Interrail ticket quotas which might make it hard to get both a seat and a bike space on the right departure.

Eurail have an online community where it might be worth asking the question: https://community.eurail.com/

If you have access to a Brompton then things would be a lot easier!

[MrsHJ]

Thank you, this is what I was thinking too. Not sure I can face the logistics of dealing with SNCF bureaucracy for the combined ticket but it is tempting for regular journeys across europe without the bike. Nb €254 for an adult, the lower price is the youth price. Him indoors has been contemplating a trip with our son to Sicily via Elba by train using interrail (I wasn’t invited!- it’s supposed to be a boys trip).

I do anyway have a carte advantage (I think you may have recommended it) so I’ll be getting my moneys worth out of that if I do a second tour. A Brompton though could be a fun way to enjoy a trans Europe rail and bike trip.

[glucas]

Don't want to be the bearer of bad news, but I think there is a seat reservation fee of €30 on Eurostar trains if you use an Interrail pass.

Edit: Ahh, I can see you are probably aware when you mention Eurostar restrictions. The 4 day ticket is interesting though. Given the Eurostar restrictions could 1 day (and therefore return leg to make 2 days) be used for the UK leg from home to ferry port + ferry? That 4 day pass could then be good value to get to the south of France or even Germany/Italy.

[bohrsatom]

We did an Interrail trip last autumn, from London to Como (with an overnight in Zurich and a trip on the amazing Bernina Express), then back home via a couple of nights in Freiburg im Breisgau in the Black Forest. No bikes! The Eurostar/SNCF legs were a hassle: we ended up arranging the trip around Eurostar availability as the Interrail seat allocation sells out far in advance. In Germany, Switzerland and Italy it was much more flexible as it's not mandatory to reserve in advance, although we did book seats on longer journeys just to be sure we wouldn't end up standing for hours.

In my experience if you can plan in advance then it's cheaper to buy individual tickets, but closer to the time of travel the Interrail pass can be better value. We left things quite late and so all the journeys making up our trip would have cost ~£700 each (in standard class!) but with a 1st class interrail it cost £400 each all in, including about £120 of seat reservations. Not cheap, but I like to think of it as 3 holidays in 1

I think a 4 or 5 day pass would be perfect for some eastern/southern Europe Brompton adventures. Spend 1 day heading as far south or east as you can, ride for a bit, when you get bored jump on the train to another country, then use the final day to try and get home!

Edit: to keep on topic, this year's plan is to combine the ferry and train to get us, the bikes and all our panniers from London to Dresden, which should be an experience.

[MrsHJ]

Don't want to be the bearer of bad news, but I think there is a seat reservation fee of €30 on Eurostar trains if you use an Interrail pass.

Edit: Ahh, I can see you are probably aware when you mention Eurostar restrictions. The 4 day ticket is interesting though. Given the Eurostar restrictions could 1 day (and therefore return leg to make 2 days) be used for the UK leg from home to ferry port + ferry? That 4 day pass could then be good value to get to the south of France or even Germany/Italy.

Yes, I think so. The man at seat 61 describes it well and listening to the Italy plans those sort of logistics have come up a lot. You can use one day each way to get in and out of your home country. https://www.seat61.com/how-to-use-an-interrail-pass.htm

I’m kind of leaning to the view here as well that I might not save anything and I’m the organised type so my tickets are booked well in advance. Eurostar is always a dog leg coming up from the West Country (plus the no/limited bikes thing) but even at £30 supplement it’s pretty good value compared with flights or ferry.

Dresden sounds like a good choice. Let us know how it goes. I’m checking daily for the SNCF tickets from Paris to Toulouse for the second half of May to be released (and I have an email alert set). Presumably the admin staff are on strike too.

[Sweep]

We did an Interrail trip last autumn, from London to Como (with an overnight in Zurich and a trip on the amazing Bernina Express), then back home via a couple of nights in Freiburg im Breisgau in the Black Forest. No bikes! The Eurostar/SNCF legs were a hassle: we ended up arranging the trip around Eurostar availability as the Interrail seat allocation sells out far in advance. In Germany, Switzerland and Italy it was much more flexible as it's not mandatory to reserve in advance, although we did book seats on longer journeys just to be sure we wouldn't end up standing for hours.

In my experience if you can plan in advance then it's cheaper to buy individual tickets, but closer to the time of travel the Interrail pass can be better value. We left things quite late and so all the journeys making up our trip would have cost ~£700 each (in standard class!) but with a 1st class interrail it cost £400 each all in, including about £120 of seat reservations. Not cheap, but I like to think of it as 3 holidays in 1

I think a 4 or 5 day pass would be perfect for some eastern/southern Europe Brompton adventures. Spend 1 day heading as far south or east as you can, ride for a bit, when you get bored jump on the train to another country, then use the final day to try and get home!

Edit: to keep on topic, this year's plan is to combine the ferry and train to get us, the bikes and all our panniers from London to Dresden, which should be an experience.

ah for the inter-rail many of us remember from our youth - just scribble your journey in a little book (very often on a whim after looking at evening departure boards) and hop on the train. I know you can now do it at a more advanced age but I won't be bothering.

[scragend]

ah for the inter-rail many of us remember from our youth - just scribble your journey in a little book (very often on a whim after looking at evening departure boards) and hop on the train. I know you can now do it at a more advanced age but I won't be bothering.

Indeed. It just seems such a faff these days. Reservations (at a cost) required for this, that and the other.

I paid £139 for a 1-zone 22-day pass in 2002, and then I got a one month Global pass the year after, and I could use them every day. There were some trains that required a reservation for about 3 euros (e.g. TGVs) but not many. We even travelled in couchettes on night trains for no extra cost. Good times

I'm not in a position to go interrailing these days but, even if I was, I don't think I'd bother either.