I have slept on trains before, of course. I don't mean drifting off on the Southern service to London Bridge, I mean properly overnighting. Not long after I left school (I honestly can't remember the year, but somewhere around 1986 or '87) my friend Peter and I did the Interrail thing, for I think ten days or three weeks, all over France, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, the Low Countries, Denmark, but saving precious time and even more precious money by catching trains between distant locations overnight wherever possible, sleeping in couchettes, seats or even in the corridor, and waking up in a different country.
Last night wasn't what you would call 'a good night's sleep'. To begin with, I wasn't tired, and Stephen Fry's 'Chronicles' is not a great soporific work. But after an hour or so I could hear Erich gently snoring below me so I turned the light out. Lying across the carriage, and with little in the way of conventional acceleration/deceleration forces, it's a bit disorientating for a while. In fact you are more likely to be moved towards your head or feet by centrifugal forces as the train encounters banked corners. It's also completely impossible to have any sense of the speed the train is doing, as the predominant noise is the air-conditioning and a much less distinct sound from the wheels on the track. There's rarely any sustained 'clackety-clack, clackety-clack' either.
All this pseudo-physics going round in my head did send me off, eventually. To be woken later by Erich taking a trip to the loo, then a text from Steve. The compartment is very small, with a possible three bunkbeds on the back wall (only two for us: the bench seats flipped over for the bottom bunk, and mine lowered from the wall; the third, if needed, is lowered from the wall even further up, with the middle bunk slid down to make equal spacing). On the front wall two wooden doors open to reveal a washstand, mirror, light and so on, and to the right of that a tiny interconnecting door to use if a family or group have two adjacent compartments. There's an effective blind on the window, and then a hotel-style solid door to the corridor on the other, with one of those punch-card keys you must remember to take with you if you go to the loo so you can get back in.
The unusual movements of the train didn't aid sleep, and although I did go off, I woke a lot too. We stopped for prolonged periods at least twice, and various clunking noises gave me the idea we were changing engines. If we were ever shunted, and we may have been, those doing it were at least sensitive to the cargo in the wagons they were moving: starting and stopping were barely perceptible.
Erich is clearly not a quiet person in the morning, although to be fair getting washed and dressed in a small, dark, unfamiliar space isn't really conducive to allowing your roommate to sleep. I didn't. Anyway, he disappeared with his breakfast-in-a-box even before we arrived at Hannover. I contemplated a bit more kip, but as I could start to see hints of the outside world (lights flashing across the compartment from under the bottom of the blind) from my high bunk, I started to get a bit too excited to sleep. I climbed down, easily worked out how to turn the bottom bunk back into three seats with armrests, and plugged my phone in to charge. Quick wash and dress, and as the eastern sun, into which we were headed, was beginning to penetrate the low mist lying over the night-frost-covered fields, I started to write this piece, only interrupted by the attendant bringing in a clip on table and my breakfast. He seemed happily surprised I'd saved him the bother of putting the seats out.
As I write this we have just stopped outside Berlin-Staaken station, so it cannot be long before we pull into the Hauptbanhof. I shall have to put the laptop away and get prepared for the start of my first day in Berlin!
This old brewery is now a cultural centre.
This is the first water tower in Berlin, constructed by an Englishman in the mid-19th century, allowing fresh running water for the first time in Germany.
Some buildings are still waiting to be done up.
Back via Konnopke's Imbiss, as predicted, for a currywurst and a Schultheiss. I ordered in German, but was floored by a question, a choice. He asked me again in English. At least I tried, which was appreciated.
This old brewery is now a cultural centre.
This is the first water tower in Berlin, constructed by an Englishman in the mid-19th century, allowing fresh running water for the first time in Germany.
Some buildings are still waiting to be done up.
Back via Konnopke's Imbiss, as predicted, for a currywurst and a Schultheiss. I ordered in German, but was floored by a question, a choice. He asked me again in English. At least I tried, which was appreciated.
