Still in training – Bled to Vienna

I think I’m forgiven – as long as we get to Vienna on time. You see, travelling by train was my idea.

Over the past week or so, I’ve been compiling one of those “ten ways to travel and see Europe” lists. To help the readers, I’m also ranking these in increasing order of what I’ve termed, ‘premiumosity’.

Option one obviously has to be backpacking. We haven’t quite experienced this first hand, but, as you’ll soon deduce, we’ve spent many a ‘pleasant’ hour sitting at train and bus stations waiting for some form of transport to arrive. Two images from this morning sort of tell the whole story. Young lady on her iPhone – “Zo, can ve book beds for two persons – yah – for tonight?” Young man, pulling his only other shirt, a pair of boots and clean(ish) underwear from the bottom of his pack – “I’m sure I have the ticket here somewhere.”

Closely linked to option one is the self-directed walking tour. We’re experts at this – find the attraction – walk to it – try to sidle up to a paid tour group and realise that’s why the guides give their guests little headsets – and speak really, really quietly into their microphones as they pass on anecdotes and information that may, or may not, be correct.

I’m not sure where the guided bus tour fits. Again, here’s a recent experience. Find our way across town to the departure point. Show the guy at the ticket booth our printout. He grunts and walks off. We assume he’s investigating something for us, but no, he’s just walking off. On the bus, we have a mix of sporadic commentary and classical music (but no Sound of Music themes, because that’s reserved for their other tour.) There’s the usual mix of people – the guy who jostles to be on first so he can grab the seats with the best view, in case his son wants to look up from his iPad from time to time – and, of course, the people who are always late. Tour guide – “be back at the bus at four o’clock sharp – we leave at four zero zero!” Everyone thinks that’s just a tour guide joke – except the young couple knocking on the closed door as the bus is preparing to pull away at 4:01. Fortunately, they are finally allowed on board and all is well.

Then comes the transfer by private car. Nanette really likes our first experience, from Munich to Salzburg. Our driver arrives early, has his car loaded up with snacks and water, and is very happy to stop whenever we want. “You want to look at this little town? No problem – take as long as you want and text me when you’re ready.” By about half-way, Nanette not only knows his wife and daughter’s names, but also the sex and intended name of the baby due in October. He drops us off with an invitation to come visit his family in Slovakia. “Remember, you have my number.” (Editor’s note – those of you who read my recent blog will know that, well, not all private car transfer experiences are the same.)

I’ve lost count of where I was up to in my premiumosity scale, so I’ll just give the next one a score of 500. It’s what I’ll call ‘de Fuhrer’ tour. Apparently, this guy named Adolf used to go to the Eagle’s Nest from time to time. We went there by bus. Adolf got driven by private road and tunnel all the way to the lift inside the mountain. Pick up point? Drop off point? “Anywhere you want sir.” (Second editor’s note – I suspect that this type of tour still exists for the very rich and very famous, but will never really be able to confirm).

So, here we are – option something or other – taking the public train. Today, we travel from Bled, Slovenia to Vienna, Austria. Bled doesn’t have convenient air links, so, way back when we sorted out our bookings, Nanette suggested we could just get another car transfer. “It would be so simple”, she said. “They’d pick us up at the apartment and take us right to our Vienna hotel.” But – I had a better plan!

“Why don’t we take the train? See, it says here that we can take the local Slovenian train from Bled to Jesenice, change to the regional train to Villach, then connect with an Austrian inter-city train to Vienna.” Nanette’s a good sport, so I booked the tickets on line. What could possibly go wrong?

It’s 9:25. We’re standing with a mixed group of backpacking twenty-somethings at the little platform of Bled Jezero station. There are no railway staff in sight. Ah, here’s a train – and look – there’s a little hand painted sign outside the driver’s window that says ‘Jesenice’. (I’ll digress here to mention that Slovenian trains have really, really steep boarding stairs – that start about a foot away from the platform. No worries dear, I’ll manhandle these half-ton suitcases in somehow.)

10:30. Standing on what we hope is the right platform at Jesenice, waiting for the regional train – that’s now nearly fifteen minutes late. Our sixteen-minute connection time at Villach is looking a wee bit ‘tight’. Oh, here’s the train. More steep steps – and it’s so full we have to stand for the next forty minutes in the little space between carriages – outside the toilet.

11:16. Villach, Austria. We do a mad run, dragging our heavy cases, to our inter-city train. Fortunately, it’s still at its (far away) platform – but it’s clearly ready to depart. The conductor isn’t happy about the two-minute delay, so he rushes us to the first open door and blows his whistle. My, these seats look nice (though, after our recent standing experience, I guess any seat would look good!) I show the on-board conductor our ticket. “No sir. This is not your carriage.” Oh – I knew it was too good to be true. “Your ticket is for first-class. This is economy. Please walk this way.”

As I write, we’re sitting in our extremely comfy seats, watching the Austrian countryside glide quietly by. The first-class waiter has just delivered our lunch and quietly withdrawn. After three and a half hours of this, I’m sure she will have forgiven me.