Trip 51

September 18, 2025

We had not planned on spending the entire day on the train from København to München, but that’s how it worked out. Some time before we left the US, Nightjet cancelled (not rescheduled, just cancelled and no other sleeper options) the sleeper we’d planned to take so we could arrive early in the morning , so the only alternative was to take a train to Hamburg (4 hours), about an hour layover, then an ICE (Inner City Express) from Hamburg to München (5 hours). And the the ICE was late. So instead of arriving about 6:30 am on the sleeper, we arrived at 7:30pm.

About an hour outside of København, we entered a tunnel that connects the islands of Zealand and Funen. For overland travel, there’s the Great Belt Bridge, one of the largest bridges in the world, which we could see in arrears as we left the tunnel area. The East Tunnel for trains at 8,024 m (4.9 miles) long, is Europe’s second longest bored tunnel after the Channel Tunnel between France and England. At its deepest point, the tunnel is 75m (246’) under the surface of the sea. The train tunnel consists of two separate tunnels with a track in each. The two tunnels are connected by 31 cross-tunnels, which function both as escape routes and contain important installations.

The ICE train was very comfortable and fortunately, the young parents who had an inconsolable child screaming at the top of his lungs directly across from us, got off the train early on.

It’s been two years since we’ve been to München and we were curious to see how much progress had been made in the total reconstruction of the train station, as well as building new rail lines underground. The answer at this point is really disappointing, as there’s even less amenities in the big arrival area than before (when construction has been underway since 2019). There are some fast food places (we needed to eat dinner) down below on the first lower level, but not many, and some of them were getting near closing time. We took the U-Bahn out , so we haven’t yet seen the exterior of the station.

One of the things we plan to do while here is Oktoberfest, which we attended for the first time in 2023. There are posters up if, for some reason, you come to München and don’t know it’s Oktoberfest .