I suppose I might as well work out how much this little jaunt cost me.
A map of this journey is available on Trainlog.me.
La Coquille – Antwerp
Although I could’ve been more prepared, I only really decided for sure that I was travelling to Antwerp nine days before I started buying the tickets.
The short TER journey from La Coquille to Limoges cost me only 2€ each way with the help of my Poor Person’s Railcard. The Limoges-Lille return cost 102,90€, thanks to the Carte Avantage Weekend.
Looking now for tickets in a month, there’s not much saving to be had buying in advance for the trains I took; the only way I could’ve got this much cheaper would’ve been to travel earlier in the day (the 06:05 is showing 35€) and save myself a tenner out the way out, but not make any saving on the way back.
I waited a little longer before working out the technicalities of what I was doing next, but in the end the onward journey from Lille Flandres to Antwerp was 29,90€. I bought it from the SNCB website because exactly the same trip on the SNCF web site was about 15€ more expensive.
Go figure.
Antwerp – Brugge
It’s worth remembering that this journey actually happened in the car so doesn’t really have a place here, but the SNCB site has weekend half-price offers.
A return first-class ticket from Antwerp to Bruges would’ve cost 25,40€. It takes an hour and a half whether you’re in a car or on the train.
Antwerp – Amsterdam
Had I not been faffing, a normal Belgian train from Antwerp to Amsterdam should have been 29€ but I missed the cheap ticket window (this looks to be seven days in advance) and so at the time of purchase, the Thalys came in the cheapest option on the (god-awful) SNCF site at 45€, including the 4€ supplement to sit in first and not get a free breakfast.
I made up for this lack of freebies by filling up in the NS International lounge on platform 1 — open to anyone with an international first-class ticket — before getting on my tram.
Amsterdam – Rotterdam
I paid NS 16,90€ at the station to travel in second from Amsterdam to Rotterdam, then a further 4€ for the metro to Akkers.
The seats in second were plenty large enough and had oodles of legroom, perhaps more than the Thalys in first.
Roosendaal – La Coquille
Last-minute, i.e. the night before, I paid 41,50€ for the journey from Roosendaal to Lille via Antwerp. This was roughly a tenner more than the cost of the journey in second, which I justified on the basis that the journey was three and a half hours long.
This means that a single from Roosendaal to Antwerp is roughly 10€, which strikes me as something of a bargain.
Tedious conclusion
I first thought it would be fun to buy an Interrail Benelux pass to do all the not-in-France journeys.
| La Coquille – Lille (return) | 106,90€ |
| Lille – Antwerp (single) | 29,90€ |
| Antwerp – Amsterdam (single) | 45,00€ |
| Amsterdam – Rotterdam – Akkers (single) | 20,90€ |
| Roosendaal – Lille (single) | 41,50€ |
A Benelux pass to cover four days of journey in the Benelux would’ve cost 161€ in second or 194€ in first.
Although I travelled in first, there was very little difference in price between the more expensive fare and second, around 10€ (much give or take) for each of the journeys, that I might have saved myself about 50€ on the entire trip by going in second, perhaps.
Also, one of the touted advantages of the Interrail pass is that you can get on and off trains at will, but Belgian trains also afford you that possibility so long as the stations you use to sate your wanderlust are are on the route you’ve booked for. Same goes for trains in the Netherlands; you can break your journey and resume it on the same day.
This seems not to be the case for cross-border tickets, but my cross-border tickets were from-here-to-there without stopping, so this was not a consideration.
In both countries, fares are calculated by the kilometre travelled, so there’s little variation in price whether you book in advance or not and frankly, if you can hop on and off at will en route, you need to be doing many places in many directions in a day for a pass to make sense.
Within Belgium for example, I can’t really see myself getting off a train between Antwerp and Bruges just to see something that isn’t Bruges. That said, I can see myself having breakfast in Antwerp, lunch in Bruges, tea in Brussels and dinner in Liège, but frankly I’d probably opt for taking the longest possible journey on a Railjet in business just to have them spoon the food into my face while I recline on that enormous leather seat with its individual window.
As this adventure was a lot more Bene than Lux, I know nothing about anywhere else.
The journeys are so short I’d probably risk second next time given that in the Bene(-lux), comfort and enjoyment are not necessarily guaranteed by the size of the seat; I had more legroom in second on an NS Intercity than in first on the Thalys.
On domestic trains nobody in first seems to think people might be there because they want some peace and quiet — in fact it seems that you travel in first now so you can spread more games and puzzles for your satanic brood over the larger table while you listen to the radio on your smartphone — so you might as just give in, travel in second anyway, and spend the 10€ saving on some headphones and an eye mask.
Oh. And there’s always enough time to visit the Spoorwegkathedraal.
