Basics - The Rough Guide to Berlin - page 17

Trains

Air New Zealand W airnewzealand.com
British Airways W ba.com
Cathay Pacific W cathaypacific.com
Continental Airlines W continental.com
Delta W delta.com
easyJet W easyjet.com
Germanwings W germanwings.com
Jet2 W jet2.com
KLM W klm.com
LOT (Polish Airlines) W lot.com
Lufthansa W lufthansa.com
Qantas Airways W qantas.com.au
Ryanair W ryanair.com
SAS (Scandinavian Airlines) W flysas.com
South African Airways W flysaa.com
Swiss W swiss.com
United Airlines W united.com

Travelling to Berlin by train costs little more but
takes far longer than flying. By far the fastest and
most popular train route to Berlin begins with
Eurostar (UK T 08432 186 186; outside the UK
T [phone] W eurostar.com) from
London St Pancras to Paris Gare du Nord (3hr), with
a change of stations to Paris Gare de l'Est for the
onward overnight train to Berlin (10hr). Return
tickets for the complete journey begin at around
£90, depending on your seating and sleeping
arrangements. You can get through-ticketing -
including the London Underground journey to St
Pancras - from mainline stations in Britain; typical
add-on prices are £30 from Edinburgh or Glasgow,
£20 from Manchester and £15 from Birmingham.

Rail passes
You can buy a rail pass for the entire German rail
network from Deutsche Bahn ( W bahn.com).
InterRail ( W raileurope.co.uk) and Eurail passes
( W eurail.com) - the latter for non-European
residents only - include other European countries.

AGENTS AND OPERATORS
Harvey World Travel New Zealand T 0800 758 787,
W harveyworld.co.nz. Great deals on flights, hotels and holidays.
Martin Randall Travel UK T 020 8742 3355, W martinrandall
.com. Small-group cultural tours, usually accompanied by lecturers: an
eight-day Berlin, Potsdam, Dresden package costs around £2500.
North South Travel UK T 01245 608 291, W northsouthtravel
.co.uk. Friendly, competitive travel agency, offering discounted fares
worldwide. Profits are used to support projects in the developing world,
especially the promotion of sustainable tourism.
STA Travel UK T 0333 321 0099, US T 1800 781 4040, Australia
T 134 782, New Zealand T 0800 474 400, South Africa T 0861
781 781; W statravel.co.uk. Worldwide specialists in independent
travel; also student IDs, travel insurance, car rental, rail passes, and more.
Good discounts for students and under-26s.
Trailfinders UK T 020 7368 1200, Ireland T 021 464 8800;
W trailfinders.com. One of the best-informed and most e cient agents
for independent travellers.
Travel CUTS Canada T 1800 667 2887, US T 1800 592 2887;
W travelcuts.com. Canadian youth and student travel firm.
USIT Ireland T 01 602 1906, Northern Ireland T 028 9032 4073,
Australia T 1800 092 499; W usit.ie. Ireland's main student and youth
travel specialists.

Buses
Travelling to Berlin by bus won't bring any major
savings over the cheapest airfares, and the journey
will be long and uncomfortable, interrupted every
three to four hours by stops at motorway service
stations. The one advantage is that you can buy an
open return at no extra cost.
Services are run by Eurolines ( W eurolines.com)
from Victoria Coach Station in London. There are
two buses daily to Berlin; the journey takes around
twenty hours and costs £101 return. Starting your
journey outside London can add considerably to the
time, but little to the cost - the complete journey
time from Edinburgh is 37 hours, but tickets start
from £116. There's about a twenty percent discount
on these rates for anyone under 26, and if you are
travelling elsewhere in Europe you might consider
buying a Europass . Busabout , meanwhile, runs
guided bus tours of Europe for young people and
offer a hop-on, hop-off bus pass ( W busabout.com).

Arrival
All points of arrival lie within easy reach
of the city centre via inexpensive and
e cient public transport; the farthest
of the city's two airports is just 25
minutes by train from Berlin's city-
centre Hauptbahnhof, where trains
from all over Europe converge. Some
trains also stop at other major stations
such as Bahnhof Zoo, Alexanderplatz

Airlines, agents and operators
AIRLINES
Aer Lingus W aerlingus.com
Air Berlin W airberlin.com
Air Canada W aircanada.com
Air France W airfrance.com