Day 12 2023. Trains. Just trains

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Friday. Train day. Up with the larks (relatively) we set off for scheibbs (sheeeeebs) to catch a train. We did indeed catch the train which although dated felt decidedly sturdy and left dead on time, how very efficiently Austrian. Hoping to get to Prochlarn to change for Vienna all was well and we settled in. Until, that was, the train stopped at a station and we had to get on a bus. All very exciting but as the bus pulled into prochlarn we realised that our connection was just a couple of minutes away. We raced off the bus, to no avail though, as we found ourselves behind slow and slower with giant suitcases and as we stepped onto the platform, with the stupid Austrian efficiency, the train left dead on time. Great. Opening up my OBB app (also very efficient) I hastily replanned our journey, the quickest option being another train to st polten then another change to get to Vienna (the tickets we had only showed us to use certain trains) we duly caught both trains and congratulated ourselves on getting to Vienna to catch our cross border train to Bratislava. Until that was, now three trains and a bus deep into our journey and feeling a little like one of those dreams where you want to get somewhere but just can't, we realised that the Bratislava trains go from the main train station, our train got us into the west Bahnhof. Great. Thanking the internet gods for Google maps and no roaming fees, I planned yet another journey to get to where we needed using trams to hop across the city. This left us twenty seven minutes to do an eighteen minute journey, print tickets and find a platform. Like ninjas we hopped on the train (not actually true) raced off it, printed tickets and near sprinted (walked faster than usual) finally getting on the Bratislava train. And.....relax. arriving in Bratislava felt familiar, Ash and I went a few years ago and ash still talks about his 'best burger ever ' at a restaurant we found. Given that we'd broken out the lunchtime sandwiches at about eleven to relieve some train related boredom, we decided to go back to the burger pub for an early tea. And it didn't disappoint. The veggie burger was as good as the meat one previously Seth proclaimed his toastie to be as good as the one in Amsterdam and all was well. Except the now torrential rain. Vetoing a wet walk into the centre, we had another drink then headed back to the station, the second country in two days to just visit for lunch (I love Europe). On the way back to the station, Steve the coypu's smaller cousin ran in front of us in the shape of the biggest rat I've ever seen. Somewhat train weary, we got back on board and headed back to Vienna. Some quick calculations told me that we had even less time than earlier to get from the Bratislava train to get the right one (well the one that allowed us to get back before dark) back. Just six minutes from getting off the connecting tram to getting into the train. Sadly the tram ran late (where is the efficiency when you need it?) and even Usain bolt would have struggled to get there on time. A half hour wait here, punctuated with a very snarly German tiny dog taking us all by surprise, took us to train number six of the day which, deposited us weary and over reliant on sugar and I spy to wait for closer to an hour for the final, seventh, train of the day. Finally back there was one last hurdle. Our holiday apartment was literally in the middle of nowhere. Neither of us were looking forward to the half hour back there but, with only one sightly wrong turn we made it. Seth had the best day, two capital cities were visited and we now have a deep understanding of the Austrian train system!

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