[Switzerland - Sweden] How taking the train to Sweden made want to travel more (despite some hiccups)
Up North: From Zurich to Malmö
It was a warm summer’s day when my friend Tobias and I boarded the train that would take us up north. Our destination was Malmö, a city in the South of Sweden. Although it would take us longer, we wanted to take the train - on the one hand, because it is more environmentally friendly, but on the other hand also because it is just a bigger adventure. And it was.
We left Zurich early in the morning, driving through the whole of Germany. We stopped in Frankfurt, Cologne, and some other cities, while enjoying a cold drink and some food along the way. Every stop was a little sneak peak into new parts of the country, as we saw the city skylines passing by. Riding by train certainly makes you more aware of how diverse a country is, and it made me want to visit the places we were passing by.
Once arrived in Hamburg, we hopped on the next train that would take us to Sweden. This train ride was particularly spectacular, as we passed beautiful landscapes, drove along the shorelines, and saw hundreds of wind mills. Finally, we arrived in Malmö around midnight, just a few minutes after the reception of our hostel closed.
Unfortunately, we were not able to get our room keys, which is why we ended up sleeping in the laundry room, but that’s a different story.
Crossing Sweden by train: From Goteborg to Stockholm
After a day in Malmö and two days in Goteborg, we hopped on the next train to get to the main destination of our trip: Stockholm. In the meantime, two friends of ours have joined us and we all took the 4 hour train across the country.
Again, it was amazing how much you could see just looking out of the window: beautiful lakes, small towns with colorful houses, rivers and a lot of untouched nature. Looking up the places we past, I was already compiling a list of things I want to see when I’ll visit Sweden another time.
I couldn't help but wonder why anyone would want to fly and miss this beautiful scenery. Anyway, we enjoyed our ride, had a few coffees in the restaurant carrier and benefitted from the free on-board entertainment through the train windows.
Back home on detours: From Stockholm to Zurich
After a week of traveling and exploring, we finally had to take the train back home to Zurich.
Remember how I was saying that train rides are a great adventure? Well, the trip back certainly proofed this.
All started in Stockholm, where we learned that our first train to Hamburg was cancelled. Sigh. Luckily we found a different connection (and because we were traveling with Interrail passes we just adapted the times on our departure card, which was super easy). All went well - nice landscapes, wind mills, card games - until we came close to Hamburg. Our train was scheduled to arrive at 11:20 pm, 10 minutes before the departure of our connection train to Zurich. However, because our train had to slow down due to traffic work on the rails right outside of Hamburg, we arrived at 11:33 pm. Sigh, again.
The next train to Zurich was at 5 am, which allowed us to explore Hamburg at night (ironically, this was what I wanted on our way up… but of course, not at this hour of the day). After a long night, we finally boarded the train at 5, and slept through our way back to Switzerland. Of course, taking a flight would have been easier and it would have saved us from a 5 hour layover in the middle of the night in Hamburg. But sometimes it’s the story you can tell at the end that makes a trip even more memorable.
Yannic (CH)
Hey! :) Thanks for reading my blogpost, I hope you got inspired to travel up North to Scandinavia by train.