In the summer of 2022, Germany came up with the brilliant idea of introducing a €9 train ticket that allowed you unlimited train travel throughout the country and even to some places just across the border. Every ticket was valid for the entire month, the only restriction being that it was only valid for regional trains. That obviously makes your travel time a lot longer than with express trains, but still, €9, so we can’t complain, right? I went on 2 separate train trips, here are my highs & lows.

This first part of the trip was fine in terms of route and trains. The only place where things got a bit uncomfortable was in Hamburg, where I still had to change trains to Bremen. Obviously a big city trainstation is going to be crowded in August, but with a €9 ticket ánd on game day, it was absolute chaos. But oh well, I found my train and we all squeezed us into the train.

Other than that, this part of my trip was really fun! Before this, I had only been to Berlin and Hamburg, and Dresden and Düsseldorf for Christmas markets. Which, by the way, I can definitely recommend! But my experience was mainly big cities and crowded situations. These trips, on the other hand, were along small villages and thus for me a completely different side of Germany. Lots of history and atmosphere and I loved it!

Train trip South of Germany

Trip number 2 took me to:

• Boppard
• Rothenburg ob der Tauber
• Kochel am See + Walchensee
• Mittenwald + a quick hike across the Austrian border
• Eibsee (photo)
• Stuttgart + Esslingen am Necktar
• Back to Boppard + Drachenfells castle

In short, I picked up roughly where I left off and now headed south. With the main purpose of enjoying the beautiful countryside and a few castles. This trip definitely didn’t go as planned, but down the line it was the most surprising trip I made in 2022. The places I saw were absolutely magical!

Nature in the south of Germany really surprised me. As a Dutchy, I always avoided Germany. It wasn’t exotic enough, I guess. I just didn’t expect it to be special and from my town it’s quite far by train anyway, so why not go somewhere else? But gosh, how I actually regret that now, haha.

The south of Germany has really beautiful nature! From beautiful blue lakes surrounded by mountains, to waterfalls and rivers through cliffs. Looking back on my 2022 travel year, this ended up being the most impressive trip I took.

The highlights were:

• The beautiful reflection of Lake Kochelsee
• The first view of the clear blue Walchensee lake after a hike that was harder than I expected
• The waterfall along the way, which I didn’t even know was there.

This hike just had everything. A nice hike, beautiful views, surprises, peaceful nature and a very satisfying end destination.

The Leutascher Geiserklamm (photo), the spot in Austria that I impulsively decided to visit, was a piece of nature that I had never seen before! And something that I’ll now forever be looking for, whenever I go for nature trips.

My final stop was the Eibsee, one of the most famous lakes in Germany. During my entire trip, I got confused faces when I mentioned I stayed at “Kochel am see”, but whenever I mentioned I was there to visit the Eibsee, they all got excited about how pretty it was. And it sure is! But to be fair, after Walchensee, I think it didn’t impress me as much as I expected. Might have been the weather as well, it was a bit cloudy, so maybe the water wasn’t as bright blue as Walchensee the day before. But if you make the trip down there, definitely visit both and decide for yourself! They are both worth a visit, just a 45 minutes busride apart. So, no reason not to stop by.

I counted on a train system I was used to, knowing that the German system would be equally as reliable as the Dutch one. Which, on normal days, means minimal delays and cancellations. I highly underestimated the delays that the €9 ticket created and therefore my journeys were so much longer and more exhausting. Even more exhausting, was the fact that there rarely was a spot to sit. Turns out that standing is much more exhausting and damaging to your body than walking, which actually resulted in physical issues. 5 Months later, my feet still hurt on a daily basis because of that trip.

Of course, I could never have known that in advance. I saw many other people travelling around Germany and everyone always seemed to have seats. I was just unlucky, I guess…. Would I do it again? Without a doubt. But with better planning.

Down the line, it was an amazing trip!

Down the line, this was really 1 of the most beautiful trips I have made so far! I really still can’t wrap my head around how beautiful the nature of southern Germany is. A bunch of places that I’ve missed due to the delays, are still on my bucketlist and my next trip to catch up on some castles is already booked!

But I took 1 big lesson out of this, and that would be to expect more delays, when there are insanely cheap train tickets available because clearly I’m not gonna be the only one taking advantage of those. So less long journeys a day, more time for exploring. So, I got out of it with amazing memories and a lesson learned, so I think that makes it a success.