Traveling Domestically

As a Freiburger for the past 2.5 months and therefore practically full-time resident, I have made many mistakes: I’ve taken the wrong tram, walked the wrong way for an inappropriate amount of time as a 20-year-old with an adaptable map in her hand, went to the wrong city, and aimed to take a bus at 5pm that’s only scheduled for 9am on Saturdays. Therefore, I can say I truly know my way around. I know what you’re thinking: clearly you should not be trusted with any type of organization or planning since you, Rosalie, had to spend $30 on a taxi for a 7km drive in the middle of nowhere because you anticipated a nonexistent bus. Right you are, dear reader! Unfortunately for you (and my fellow Freiburg citizens), I’m legally an adult and therefore will continue to attempt to travel locally and make errors and learn from them. Fortunately for you, I’ve decided to put aside the shame and embarrassment and enlighten you on how to avoid the same mistakes. 

Tram travel: if you’ve been following my posts for long enough, you should know that DB Navigator, VAG mobile, and Google Maps are the best and most helpful apps in the world. Use them! VAG mobile will tell you when trams are arriving and departing from each stop. Therefore, if you’re trying to determine a time to meet to catch the tram in the morning, there’s a handy app in your phone that will tell you exactly when it gets there without you having to physically go to the stop. Make sure the tram is going in the right direction (please). If you live in Vauban, going to school at IES you take the 3 towards Haid and if you want to go home, you take the 3 towards, you guessed it, Vauban. 

Train travel: DB Navigator is the only app you’ll need in Freiburg (an exaggeration, but an important point). DB Navigator takes your departure location and your intended destination and creates a perfectly personalized and coherent itinerary for you. Use it to your advantage! Create routes and try to follow them! Surely, nothing will go wrong! Unless you’re trying to go to Breisach. 

Breisach story interlude: once upon a Saturday, my friend group and I decided to travel to Breisach for the afternoon. A casual train ride, around 30-40 minutes if I remember correctly, that would allow us to eat lunch, walk through the town, visit the castle, and get back home before dinner time. We even talked about how we would have too much time in Breisach. How wrong we were! In America, and forgive me if I’m wrong because I’m from the South where trains don’t exist, trains typically stay linked together. In Germany, however, trains split apart from one another. In the middle of the train. And you’re on the S10 towards Breisach because that’s what the train said, but you’re actually on the S1 towards who knows where because apparently trains split apart here. You see, dear reader, my friends and I waited for our train (S10) to come and yet the S1 train kept arriving in its place. When journeying down the platform after skipping the first train, we realized that S10 was written on the side of the train that we (correctly) thought was the S1 and it said heading towards Breisach. So, we hopped on, so naive and young and not hangry at all. Then the train split apart. We eventually, after walking and changing trains multiple times, managed to get to Breisach. After 2 hours of travel. Don’t be like us: be aware of your surroundings and trains and use the DB Navigator app. And if you’re confused, please ask the people around you because people want to help and most speak English. 

Train travel, pt. 2: Odds are, they’re not going to check your ticket. You’ll have your little signed Regiokarte within arm’s reach the entire time just for them to not check your ticket. That does not mean, however, that you should go on any train without a ticket: you will incur a fee that your family will be paying off for generations. If you decide that I’m dumb and you’re going to rip off the system because they’re not checking tickets, then please do not go on an ICE train without a ticket. They will check your ticket on an ICE train. 

Train travel, pt. 3: There are so many regional trains moving all of the time, and your Regiokarte covers all of these trains. Therefore, there is no reason at all to pay the extra $30 for an ICE train. Sure, they’re more reliable and get there faster, but there’s no charm in an ICE train. There’s charm in realizing you did not make return plans from Basel because you figured you’d just catch a regional train with your Regiokarte and there are no regional trains except for 4 minutes from now and 3 hours from now. There’s charm in running from one random train to the next in the Basel Bad Bf to make the next regional train to Freiburg that you learned about 4 minutes ago. There’s charm on the regional train that you ride from Basel at 6pm on a Sunday that gets delayed for an extra half an hour and you have to stand in the aisle and braid and rebraid your friends’ hair to keep from going insane. Invest in the charm, save money, don’t buy an ICE ticket. 

Train travel, pt. 4: Colmar. Just take the train to Breisach, then get on the bus. Don’t do it any other way, it’s not worth it. 

Google Maps: I know I just raved about the innate perfection that is Google Maps, but even the greatest cathedrals have flaws. Google Maps will, on occasion, tell you that a bus exists when a bus does not exist. It may do this numerous times. Google this bus’s schedule. Go to the bus stop (if you’re able) and see if the bus runs differently on weekends rather than weekdays (spoiler: it is different on weekends). Plan accordingly. Read the fine print. Triple check your sources on multiple apps. 

Titisee and Schluchsee: Visit them! Use regional trains to visit them, they’re the most simple destinations to reach and they’re so worth the longer train ride. Both are beautiful lakes in the mountains, and the train ride to reach them is beautiful. 

Todtnau: Will the travel and connections be hellish? Yes. Will you have a fun day on a suspension bridge and on a toboggan run? Yes. Therefore, is it worth it? Yes, but follow these steps. Take the S1 to Kirchzarten, walk down the street to the bus stop and wait for the 7215. Get onto the 7215. Get off at Hangloch and go on the suspension bridge. Get on the 7215 bus again. Get off at the Busbahnhof and see the city and ride the Hasenhorn Rodelbahn! Your Regiokarte covers this entire journey! 

Make sure to also visit Kirchzarten and Feldberg for hiking (but more on that later). 

Traveling domestically is one of the greatest joys of studying abroad, and getting to know your surroundings is extremely rewarding (and also Germany is incredibly beautiful). Overall, travel domestically, but intelligently!