All aboard, we’re off to Stockholm, by rail this time.

Following my Liverpool trip in a previous blog, this time I recall a trip to Sweden. 

By rail, not air, which has lost much of its allure.

I like an airport where you can walk across the tarmac to the sleek flying machine. Now, airports have become garish shopping malls and  restaurants. 

Oddly, you need to pass through passport control and customs to get to the shops.

After a while you move into a large room with other people, and from there down a windowless corridor  to a doorway into a small cylinder packed with rows and rows of seats.

Last time we flew we waited 90 minutes on the runway because of violent thunderstorms! Did wonders for the nerves.

At last, the captain announced that the tower had told him they could just about see a hole in the storm clouds, big enough to get through. But that we had to be quick before it closed!!!...GO...GO...GO.

Great roaring sound and we are pressed back into the seat as everything tilts upwards and we are catapulted into the sky and through that hole, presumably. Exciting bit over. 

Then there is silence, stillness, no sense of movement through the motionless sky. And then everything happens in reverse. Great noise, bump, and then out of the cylinder, into a corridor and voila, another shopping mall where all the signs are incorrectly spelt.

Next time we went by rail and spent two days travelling through northern Europe: four changes of trains in all.

                                            Changing trains at Cologne.

This was a 2,000 kilometres (approx.) rail journey from Surrey to Stockholm, located in the south of Sweden, on roughly the same longitude as Edinburgh.

Whereas Edinburgh is at the northern end of the UK, Stockholm is at the southern end of Sweden, which stretches a further 1000 kilometres north into the land of the reindeer, across the Arctic Circle.

Long hot summer days in Stockholm (18 hours of daylight at the June solstice) brings the mozzies out by the water and contrasts with very cold long winter nights (18 hours of darkness in January) when the ice breakers go to the work in the Baltic.

I recall an earlier visit at Christmas when everything was a glistening frozen white

beneath a blue, cloudless sunny sky.  It was minus 17c and that was at midday!

Although flying is quicker, it still takes the best part of a day to get to Stockholm with all the faffing about getting to and from and in out of airports.

Rail is city to city and you have a sense of place because you get to look out of the window at the world going by noting the subtle changes in landscape and buildings as you go.

At 09.35 we depart our local station for London Waterloo and take a taxi from there to St Pancras International, admiring the beautifully restored 19^th century Midland Railway terminus with its blue painted roof curving high over the sleek 18-car Eurostar trains.  The roof boasts the largest span of a railway station in the UK.

There we board the 12.57 Eurostar for Brussels in Belgium, a 2 hour 11 minute ride for the 232 mile journey, at a top speed of 186mph!  At Brussels we change trains and take the Thalys express to Cologne in Germany, a 1 hour and 45 minutes ride.

From Cologne we board the Night City Link, a sleeper, for Copenhagen in Denmark, arriving there the following day, Sunday. This long train has connections for Berlin and Warsaw, and suffers delays on its journey. Instead of nine and half hours, it takes 13 hours!

Finally, from Copenhagen, we are due to take the X2000 express for Stockholm, the Swedish capital. But because we are late, we must rearrange our booking for later in the day.  So we take a local train to Malmo, just across the water in Sweden (via the spectacular 7.8-kilometre long bridge over Baltic Sound), to enjoy a splendid late lunch in the station. Finally we join the inter-city express for the final 500 kilometres to Stockholm, arriving Sunday evening, some 32 hours after setting out.

It amused us that during this great trek, the mobile phone services of each country kept track of where we were, sending us text messages of “welcome” to punctuate our journey across the borders of five countries.

“Welcome to France,” as we popped out of the Channel tunnel, and soon after that. “Welcome to Belgium”. Later that evening, “Welcome to Germany”. At about 8.30 the following day, “Welcome to Denmark”. Finally, that afternoon, “Welcome to Sweden”.

But therein lies a rail traveller’s tale, of a mixture of emotions. The excitement and anticipation interspersed with anxiety at the prospect of missed connections. There were four changes of train across Europe, in Belgium, Germany, Denmark and Sweden.

The longest delay came on the second day, in Denmark, when just after 9am the engine failed at a place called Vojens. We were told another loco would be despatched and in the meantime, why don’t we stretch our legs on the platform and enjoy the sunshine.

I recall one guy who was wearing a tee-shirt with a most appropriate message across the chest: “Where’s my train?”…!

Did he know something?

        An unscheduled stop somewhere in Denmark: Where's my train?

Eventually the new loco turned up and our overland rail adventure, now considerably delayed, continued.

All made possible by the Channel Tunnel, at 50 kilometres from end to end - thirty seven of those under water - the longest underwater tunnel in the world.

Takes the train thirty five minutes to get through, at 160kph an hour.

At the lowest point, you are sitting 75 metres deep below the sea bed and 115 metres below sea level.

Best not dwell upon that!

Upon our return I was struck by how small and claustrophobic Eurostar seemed compared to the larger, more spacious European trains, which run to a wider loading gauge than in Britain.

That wasn't the only difference. 

There were no checks whatsoever  as the train crossed the borders between France, Belgium, Germany, Denmark and Sweden where train staff greeted us with broad smiles and a welcome. 

This contrasted starkly with the  British border control for Eurostar at Brussels manned by unsmiling glaring officials resembling prison officers, waiting to process everyone back into custody in Fortress Britain.

The draw bridge gets pulled up for good on New Year's Eve.