Travel Basel to Den Haag - Wednesday 11 September

 

A Dutch speciality - pancake with cheese, mushrooms and bacon.

This was the only picture I took today - after we had finally arrived at Den Haag.

We went early to the station at Basel  to check on our train to Dusseldorf only to find out it had been cancelled. A visit to the SBB ticket office revealed that the train hadn't actually been cancelled but was starting today from Karlsruhe. They found a connecting train leaving a little earlier which we took. This became progressively later and later so that it arrived at Karlsruhe just as the connection was about to pull out. A frantic dash across the platform and we were able to claim our seats. The journey to Dusseldorf was peculiar, There were periods when the train went fast (up to almost 200 kmph) and other periods when it dawdled. It progressively lost time except that it arrived at its final destination, Dusseldorf, eleven minutes early. (An injudicious use of recovery time in the schedule?)

Dusseldorf gave us an opportunity to regroup while waiting for the next leg of the journey to Utrecht Centraal. However, this did not go smoothly as the platform was changed just before the train arrived. Again there was much dawdling and we lost our path behind a stopping train so that we missed the connection to Den Haag. We caught the next train to Den Haag and arrived just 15 minutes after the original schedule. However, the way DB operated left a great deal of uncertainty and what should have been a pleasant experience was made unpleasant worrying about whether we would be able to make the connections.

We left Basel at 0906 and arrived at Den Haag at 1806.

The weather has been an amazing mix of heavy cloud, heavy rain and bright sunshine. As we approached Den Haag on the final stretch of our journey a bright rainbow appeared to welcome us to the Netherlands.