$33 for an upgrade to first class? Europe’s trains are incredible
By Flip Byrnes
The journey
Deutsche Bahn ICE 275 Karlsruhe (Germany) to Basel (Switzerland), one hour, 47 minutes. This is the third train in a 10-hour, six-train cross-Europe odyssey delivering us to the French mountain playground of Chamonix via Switzerland.
First class with Deutsche Bahn.
The class
First class. When the Deutsche Bahn website (bahn.de) points out the small extra fee – €20 ($33) – to upgrade to a first-class ticket, I leap at it like the doors are about to close.
Carbon emissions
Germany’s Deutsche Bahn ICE, IC and EC trains all use 100 per cent renewable power and have done so since 2018. The website offers an Environmental Mobility Check tool, devising a CO2 emissions total (0.03kg CO2 on this trip). This compares with the equivalent journey by car (36.6kg) or plane (60.7kg).
The seat
Seats 1 – 8. We walk to the very nose through the Quiet Zone (separated by glass doors from the rest of first class) and discover behind a final door an empty noise proof chamber with eight leather seats and colonise it all.
Baggage
The beauty of train travel are no baggage charges or weight restrictions (bicycles need a ticket on long distances). I see people negotiating large suitcases up the train steps and attempting to find homes in the limited suitcase area. It looks stressful. A nugget of European train travel advice, take carry on or if you have to take a suitcase, make it a malleable soft one.
Inside the first class cabin travelling Deutsche Bahn to Switzerland.
Food + drink
Peering through the glass doors into first class it always looks so quiet and clean and I can happily confirm it is. Plus, there’s seat service. That’s the biggie, no doing the moving-train-disco-dance back to your seat with a hot kaffee mit milch. Travelling with small children I have exactly five times more snacks than required so don’t order from the bistro – where the food looks unhealthy and average in any case.
One more thing
“Run for your lives!” This is what I yell at my two children sprinting from a delayed regional train to the ICE (the name of Germany’s fast trains, capable of 260km/h). We miss it by a whisker; European trains tend to come in hot and when they go, there’s no mercy. If planning a multi-train marathon, leave early to accommodate any issues and build in connection buffers.
The verdict
The cheapest plane tickets Frankfurt to Geneva would have cost €350 ($580) in total, so our €85 first class train adventure (children up to 14 years are free) is an absolute win, even with a mishap or two. Trains in Europe are incredible, you can go almost anywhere door to door.
Our rating out of five
★★★★
The writer travelled at her own expense.
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