Booking To Geneva And Rotterdam On Eurostar
As an experiment, I just wanted to see if I could book direct to Rotterdam on the Eurostar web site.
You can’t, but you can book direct to several Swiss cities in one go on the Eurostar web site.
I was also able to get a ticket to Brussels for just £38 on the day I wanted. To get to Rotterdam using another site, adds another £21. But I want to go to The Hague. That cost £76 or twice the London-Brussels fare.
I suspect tourists, who after spending a few days in London, who perhaps wanted to see Europe by rail, wouldn’t start by going to The Netherlands. But they might go and look at the pleasures of Switzerland.
An E-Mail To Eurostar
The fuss about getting to The Netherlands by train seems to be escalating. I’ve had an e-mail which is very critical of the withdrawal of the local service from The Netherlands.
Although I had some unofficial feedback from a Eurostar employee, I thought it would be an idea to get the corporate view. So I sent this e-mail to the company.
I have bought a ticket to Any Dutch Station a couple of times, and find it is the easiest way to get to see my friend in The Hague.
I now see that this ticket has been discontinued and that there is no direct link to The Hague from Brussels.
I went in to your ticket office in St. Pancras last week and talked to one of your excellent sales staff. She felt that this is not best for Eurostar, as she told me, that she used to sell quite a few of these tickets.
I shall probably fly to Schipol in future, as it is the easiest way to get to anywhere other than Rotterdam or Amsterdam in The Netherlands.
I write for various publications and shall be writing a hard hitting article about this fiasco, which is obviously not of Eurostar’s doing.
I shall be going to The Netherlands via Brussels some time next week to see how the Dutch deal with a stroppy tourist, who wants to get a direct train from Brussels to The Hague.
The other great thing about the Any Dutch Station ticket was that you booked it in one, from your excellent web site.
I’ll post their reply when I get it.
Who Is Burt?
The caption on the travel news on BBC London this morning said.
London Bridge bus station is closed due to burts water main.
Who is this Burt? And why does he own an important water main?
Cardiff looks At A Tram Network
Cardiff appears to have various transport problems and a fair bit of congestion, so it is refreshing to see a well-thought out plan being proposed using trams to solve it. It all described here on the BBC’s web site as Cardiff Crossrail.
It may not be ideal and it may just stay in the planning stage, but at a proposed cost of £200 million it would appear to be affordable.
it also seems to make good use of existing infrastructure, which is obviously the way to go. The new London Overground showed that you get value-for-money by this approach and what money you do spend, can be concentrated on what the customers see, like the trains and the stations.
I shall be interested to see how the planning of this project progresses.
To Notting Hill For a Pizza
As a coeliac, I don’t get to eat pizza very often. In fact the last time, I ate one, was in Naples in 2009. But that was rather special in that the restaurant was one of the best in that wonderful city in Italy.
Otto Pizza is a short walk from Notting Hill Gate station. I found it on the web last night, after I felt that after seeing the poster in La Porchetta, that I ought to have found gluten-free pizza in the over two years, that I’ve lived in London.
So this lunchtime, I took the Underground to Notting Hill Gate station and then got a 328 bus to outside the restaurant at the Artesian Road stop. Not only did I have a delicious double-flavour pizza, I had a gluten-free beer as well.
The only problem was that streams of Wonga-encrusted buses kept stopping outside.
In fact in one short period of time, of the eight buses that stopped, five had adverts for the barely-legal loan shark. And of the three that didn’t, one was a half-size bus and the other was still an advertising virgin, unmarked by commerce.
As to the unusual pancetta and sprout pizza, it was something I liked a lot. But C, would have really turned up her nose at the Grapes of the Devil.
This is a restaurant that deserves to succeed big time, if only because it doesn’t follow the rule book laid down by big chains.
Train Ticketing For Football
In the last few months, I’ve been to Barnsley, Birmingham, Bolton, Brighton, Hull, Leeds, Leicester and Wolverhampton to see Ipswich Town play. Although in some cases like Hull and Leicester the football wasn’t the best, I’ve not had much of a problem with the trains. Except of course in getting to Ipswich, where they have chosen match day Saturdays to rebuild the line.
Usually, I travel First Class either one or both ways. On the Wolverhampton trip, where I could be sure of my times, I used Advance tickets that cost just £31 with a Senior Railcard. Some of the supporters, I met at the game, were rather surprised at the price.
But sometimes, I’ll get Off Peak Second Class and pay the upgrade, if it is available, like it is on Virgin. GreaterAnglia and others.
Next Saturday, I’m going to see Ipswich in the FA Cup at Aston Villa. For that game, I’ll book the outrun on a specific train using an Advance First Class ticket on Virgin, as they seem cheaper than Chiltern and stop in New Street, where I can get the train to Witton for Villa Park. but coming back, I’ll get an ordinary Off Peak Standard Class ticket, as that will mean I can get any train. If I want to upgrade to First Class it will cost me £10 on the train.
I’ve just booked the two tickets and they cost me a total of £31.65.
The Friendly Wilfrunians
I went to see Ipswich play Wolverhampton Wanderers yesterday.
After a sort of brunch in Carluccio’s in Islington, where I had a gluten-free eggs florentine with a portion of pancetta added to mop up the egg yolk and sauce, I took the 12:23 train from Euston.
The ticket was good value in that after my Senior Railcard discount, I paid just £15.50 each way for the direct train. That would have been good value in Standard Class, but I was travelling First both ways. And like most First Class in trains timed for three o’clock football, there was plenty of space both ways. Compare this with the nearly 80 Euros I would have been charged for one way between Brussels and Den Haag.
It was a ticket, that I’d bought a few days ago on-line, but then if you’re going away to watch a football match, you have your schedule days or even weeks before. It would certainly cost you more than £31 to go by road, and you wouldn’t be sitting there doing nothing, except read the paper and drink free coffee.
We arrived on time in Wolverhampton and it isn’t the longest walk to the ground from the station. Especially after directions from a friendly local policeman, who was pleased to give me excellent directions. Not a feature of all places in the UK.
But I’d forgotten my ticket, so I had to buy another one. The supervisor said that if I returned the unused ticket to Ipswich, I might get my money back.
Molineux is a good stadium, with wide comfortable seats. Not that I need the wide bit! The view was good too!
Inside Molineux
Wolves too, followed the tone set by the city and were very friendly. So Ipswich left with a two-nil victory.
The only unfriendly thing, was the loud booing of the home side by their own fans.
I don’t think I’ll return the unused ticket, but at £24 to the £14 I paid on the day, it wasn’t as good a value.
So perhaps on large grounds well away from Ipswich, it might be better to buy the ticket on the day.
I finished the day by getting a 30 bus to the Angel and having a curry in the Angel Curry Centre. This is ideal after a trip that ends in one of the stations on Euston Road, as the bus stops just a few metres from the door.
The Dutch And The Belgians Create A Mess
I have read in Modern Railways that because there is now a high speed rail line from Rotterdam to Brussels, that the Inter City service from Den Haag to Brussels has been withdrawn.
I’ve used this a couple of times, by buying a Eurostar ticket from London to Any Dutch Station. This ticket has been withdrawn as well.
I also looked up how to get from Brussels to Den Haag and you either have to use the high speed line or go halfway round the Netherlands to places you don’t want to visit. Apparently, Dutch who commute into Brussels aren’t pleased either!
The high speed tickets aren’t cheap!
I think next time I go to Den Haag, I’ll fly to Schipol and get a train from there.
A pity that, as Eurostar does a rather nice gluten-free meal with wine and easyJet doesn’t.
It all seems a bit like making passengers arriving on Eurostar at St. Pancras, who want to go to Scotland, always go via Newcastle and change trains there.
I just wonder how many tickets, Eurostar will sell to The Netherlands in the next few years. Not many, I’d venture.
I’ve also found this report on a Dutch news web site.
The Anonymous Widower 