The end of October last year saw me heading to Glasgow once again for work however, due to engineering works on the East Coast Mainline north of Doncaster and a fully booked Sleeper, I had to take a different route to normal. My route of choice was to head across to Birmingham and then catch an Avanti service from there and, with a four-hour journey to Scotland ahead of me I of course lined up a Seatfrog upgrade. Unfortunately, whilst on my way across to Birmingham, it became clear that my relaxing journey was already off to a bad start…

With us having arrived back in The Netherlands by way of a Deutsche Bahn (DB) Intercity service from Hannover, our arrival into Rotterdam at the end of this leg would just leave a couple of local trains/metros before boarded the ferry home. And so, for this final long-distance train of the trip from Hilversum to Rotterdam Centraal, we’d be travelling onboard one of NS’ (Dutch Railways) new Intercity trains in 1st class. These Intercity Nieuwe Generatie (ICNG) trains have been introduced since my last journey on an NS ‘Intercity Direct’ service so I was looking forward to trying one out.

After an enjoyable couple of weeks spent based in Dresden and Hildesheim, with plenty of exploring of both those cities and day trips to others, it was unfortunately time to head home. The journey back to the UK would see us heading back to The Netherlands and the city of Rotterdam, before catching the overnight ferry back across the North Sea to Harwich. However, before we got there, there would be a couple more interesting trains to try out and so, after a short S-bahn ride into from Hildesheim, we found ourselves at Hannover Hauptbahnhof (Hbf) once again, ready to begin heading west.

After a full day of exploring the wonderful city of Hamburg which included the obligatory visit to Miniatur Wunderland as well as plenty of other sights, it was time to make my way back to Hildesheim. For this return journey, I’d be travelling on a Deutsche Bahn (DB) ICE service from Hamburg Hauptbahnhof (Hbf) to Hanover Hbf where I’d change on to the Hanover S-bahn network to get back to Hildesheim. And so, with about an hour before the train departed I was sat nursing a coffee in the McDonalds overlooking the platforms at Hamburg Hbf as although DB do have a lounge for first class passengers, access isn’t allowed for those travelling on cheaper tickets.

With just a few days left in Germany before we began our journey home, I had decided to have a solo day trip whilst the rest of the group had decided to visit the town of Wolfenbüttel. With our base in Hildesheim being less than a couple of hours by train from one of my favourite cities, it felt only right that I headed there for the day and so I set off from Hildesheim to begin my journey to Hamburg. Unfortunately, whilst Hildesheim is on the east-west Berlin to Hannover high-speed line, services to Hamburg generally run along the north-south lune and so I would have to change trains at Hannover.

Our arrival into Berlin Haupbahnhof (Hbf) had been by way of a slightly delayed DB Intercity service which had dropped us off in the depths of the station’s low-level platforms. For the second leg of the journey, we’d be travelling on a DB Intercity Express (ICE) service from Berlin to Hildesheim, the town in Lower Saxony that would be our base for the second half of our holiday. So, with around 45 minutes until our next train was scheduled to depart we made our way upstairs to the entry level of the five-tier station ready to get on with the second part of our travel day.