3Bs, 1K/C and home again... Or a brief European tour involving 1 plane, 6 trains, 3 (or possibly 6) countries at least 10 languages and goodness knows how many buses/trams/metro type trains. And a trolleybus. A fairly standard report about BA but some less common stuff about German trains and Eurostar and I don't recall having seen a report on Czech sleeping cars before.

This is a Trip Report about a journey I took with my brother in April 2013. BrotherNCFC is not a FT member but with any luck he'll let me post his pictures and videos. It's been a while since we went travelling together so some months ago (probably whilst drunk) we decided a trip was overdue. There's a few reasons why we don't travel together, mostly luck/timing but there's also my fondness for spending time in places versus his interest in riding on trains to as many different places as possible and my fondness for travelling light versus his large rollerboard needed for his favourite souvenier - beer. The good news is that we have similar hobbies/interests and do get on very well.

Our main destination was going to be Budapest but with a journey home to the UK via Berlin, Cologne and Brussels. Armed with this knowledge the observant amongst you will have figured out the thread title which is also a reference to our home town of Reading, historically famous for producing the 3 Bs - biscuits, beer and (plant) bulbs. So if anyone was looking for information about United's frequent flyer scheme try elsewhere (or try flying lots on United, that normally works quite well as a way of getting United status). Although I could be really cruel and sprinkle references to 1K/United throughout the text thus bamboozling google and all who rely on it. For anyone puzzling over the K/C it depends on whether you want to call it Cologne or, as the Germans themselves call it, Köln. Being a lazy git I shall probably use both rather than making the effort to be consistent.

Planning responsibility for the trip was divided in the interests of spreading the blame when things went wrong (and to minimise the smell of burning credit card). BrotherNCFC researched and booked the trains (his area of expertise) and I booked our flight and hotels and acquired a guidebook and other information necessary to function in Budapest. Since BrotherNCFC has previous experience of both Cologne and Berlin he was in charge of planning for those cities. Since we'd both previously been to Brussels we didn't do any planning for that bit at all.

Our finalised Itinerary was:

7th April (Sunday) BA0868 LHR to BUD in Club Europe (bought Eurotraveller tickets in a cheap fare bucket and took advantage of BA's standard £69 upgrade offer. We don't fly very much so we're only BA blues (the entry tier); the upgrade meant lounge access as well as extra avios and tier points.
Check into IBIS Budapest Centrum (I got 3 nights for the price of 2 on expedia and also paid slightly below the standard rate)

8th-10th April in Budapest

Night of 10th April (Wednesday) night train to Berlin which BrotherNCFC booked at the lowest possible rate by jumping on DeutscheBahn's website the day it went on sale.

11th April (Thursday) Check into Ramada hotel Alexanderplatz in Berlin. I had a real problem finding us somewhere reasonably priced until we decided we'd share a twin room. Then I had problems finding us a twin room. But this one came at a pretty good price although we did have to phone to ensure we were allocated a twin room rather than a double. Sightseeing in Berlin.

12th April (Friday) ICE train from Berlin to Cologne. Two and a half hours in Cologne. ICE train from Cologne to Brussels. An hour and a half in Brussels followed by Eurostar to London. Or possibly 2 and a half hours if we could change our Eurostar booking to the later train once we got to Brussels. First class on both ICEs and premium standard on the Eurostar. Both booked at good rates by BrotherNCFC. Followed by tubing it across London and a train home from Paddington.

So yeah a slighly ambitious thread title, what with the time spent in Brussels and Cologne totalling about 6 hours if we were lucky. Of course if we were really unlucky and subject to some serious train delays who knew how long we'd be in Cologne or Brussels. Anyone keeping count will only have noticed 3 countries. So why the possibly 6? Well the Eurostar went through France and the night train through Slovakia and the Czech Republic. So whether we visited those countries is really down to your opinion. As for the 10 languages? Well 7 should be fairly obvious but you can start guessing the other 3.

A final note... I'm not one of FTs most skilled or patient photographers plus my camera is on the old side and the flash has a mind of its own. So a couple of the pictures are nice but none of them are great. On which note i'd better starting writing and uploading photos. Maybe I should unpack too?