We travelled from Switzerland to Denmark by train – the journey took 24 hours

The idea was simple: to see how realistic it is to travel from Switzerland to Scandinavia by train without a direct overnight connection. Kristian Brandt / SWI swissinfo.ch

After the Swiss parliament cut funding for a Basel to Malmö night train, Swissinfo journalist Kristian Brandt tried a similar route with his daughter. What followed was a day-long journey that shows the pluses, minuses and new opportunities for this alternative to flying.

It’s half past seven in the evening when my daughter and I board the ÖBB Nightjet in Zurich. She is excited. Night trains feel like an adventure to her. For me, they’re an eco-friendly convenience – a flight would be faster, but the train pollutes less, and I can sleep away the extra time it takes to travel on the ground.

I booked the tickets two days earlier. CHF180 ($230) for two spots in a four-person mixed couchette compartment to Hamburg. Not luxury, but we have beds.

The compartment is narrow. The upper bunks fold down from the wall. Between Zurich and Basel, we are alone, which makes it easier to organise our luggage and change into night clothes.

In Basel, two more passengers join us: Géraldine and Vincent from Lausanne, who are starting a weeklong holiday.

“We want to try the night train as an experience,” Vincent tells me. “And from an ecological point of view, flying for just one week feels absurd when there is a train solution that is feasible.”

They will travel with us to Hamburg where we will change to trains bound for Denmark. Our destination is Struer, theirs is Copenhagen.

“It doesn’t bother us to change trains,” Géraldine says. “But if there had been a direct train, we would have taken it. It would simply have been easier.”

A direct train was in the works – a line that would travel from Basel to Malmö, Sweden, stopping in Copenhagen and other cities along the way. But earlier this year, the Swiss parliament cut federal subsidies for the line and plans were called off. My daughter and I are on our journey to see what a rail trip to Scandinavia looks like without a direct overnight link.

The train departs on time and sways through the evening. We play a game of chess. Around 10.30pm, we turn off the lights.

One hour delay

Nine hours later, over breakfast – two bread rolls each with marmalade and coffee or tea – I ask our cabin-mates how they slept.

“Quite good,” Géraldine says. “We sleep fairly well. I think we would repeat the experience.”

Vincent nods. “You shouldn’t expect luxury. It’s basic, but it’s fine. A good experience.”

At this point, everything seems to be going well.

Then I check the timetable. We’ve just passed Bremen, and are an hour behind schedule.

That means we will miss our connections. Under the original timetable of the cancelled Basel–Malmö night train, we would already have been in Copenhagen – 15 minutes before our Nightjet was due to arrive in Hamburg.

Instead, when we pull in just under two hours later, railway staff inform us that all trains to Denmark are cancelled due to operational problems. A bus will take us the rest of the way. He also confirms that our existing ticket will be valid for the continuing trip, which is not always the case in these situations. Sometimes, a missed connection can lead to navigating new bookings and refund requests between different national rail services.

From night train to bus

We walk through light snow and find where we board our bus. I ask Vincent what he thinks of rail travel now.

“It’s still nice,” he says. “It’s a perfect example of why it could be interesting to have a direct train between Basel and Copenhagen. We’ll call it adventurous.”

Ninety minutes after we arrived in Hamburg, we are on a bus for Denmark.

The accommodations here are a step down from the train. The bus is full and the toilet is locked.

We arrive in the city of Fredericia 35 minutes behind schedule. If my daughter and I miss the next connecting train, we will arrive in Struer roughly four hours later than we had planned. We bid Géraldine and Vincent goodbye and stand near the exit as our stop approaches. As soon as the bus door opens, we move quickly. We reach the platform with only minutes to spare and catch our train.

We arrive at our destination at 5pm. I feel both relieved and exhausted. I am satisfied that we made it without flying, but aware how tenuous the journey was. One missed connection would have added hours to an already long trip.

The tradeoffs of train travel

In Denmark and the wider Scandinavian rail community, the decision to cancel the Basel-Malmö train was met with frustration. Some supporters described the cancellation as “tragic”.

“The night train between Malmö and Basel would have been a significant boost to Nordic-European routes and a major environmental gain, as many people, for example, would gladly save the cost of a hotel night by taking the train instead of flying,” says Jeppe Strandberg chairman from The Nordic Association Copenhagen, an NGO that promotes cooperation and mobility across the Nordic countries.

During a debate on the Swiss public television program Arena, SVP National Councillor Lars Guggisberg argued that such a route is unnecessary. Travellers can already take a night train to Hamburg and continue on a different route the next morning – as I did.

Today, as we discovered, each journey relies on multiple operators and timetables functioning smoothly across borders.

Because of track work in Germany, there is no night train to Switzerland on the day we plan to go home. Instead, we leave at 6am and arrive in Fribourg at 9pm – fifteen hours later.

The return ticket costs CHF127 for both of us. Combined with the CHF180 tickets to Hamburg and CHF65 onward to Denmark, the total rail cost comes to about CHF370. A round-trip flight would cost around CHF225 per person including hand luggage: slightly more expensive for two people, but significantly faster.

Of course, flying is not frictionless. Airlines typically advise passengers to arrive at least two hours before departure. Baggage collection can add further waiting time after landing. And delays and cancelations happen with planes and trains alike.

In 2025, around 82% of ÖBB’s long-distance trains, including Nightjet services, arrived within five minutes of schedule. By comparison, roughly 71% of European short-haul flights arrive within 15 minutes of schedule.

But the uncertainty of rail delays and the lack of constant trains between cities – compared to several daily flights between major European airports – can make the more ecologically sound trip impractical and uncomfortable. Instead of waiting in an airport for a new flight, passengers may travel from station to station en route to their destination, visiting a new ticket office each time.

Financial uncertainty

When something goes wrong on the train, fixing the problem is more complicated. Booking a flight means signing up for a single protected contract: one booking, automatic re-routing, clear passenger rights. Rail journeys across borders often don’t work the same way.

In my case, because I had booked the Nightjet and the onward connection with different operators, I received a partial refund only for the delayed Zürich–Hamburg leg – 25% of that ticket – even though the disruption affected the entire journey. The missed connection beyond Hamburg fell outside the claim.

SurveysExternal link across several European countries suggest that most people would consider night trains if prices were competitive and services were reliable. Many are willing to spend five hours or more on a train instead of flying, and a significant share would travel more by long-distance rail if booking were simpler.

Europe has built a single aviation market over decades. Its night trains remain patchworked.

Night trains are in demand

ÖBB says it carries more than 1.5 million night passengers annually and has reached a high level of capacity on its Nightjet network, which links Zurich, Basel and Vienna with Hamburg, Berlin, Amsterdam, Rome, Milan and other major European cities. Expansion is limited less by interest than by infrastructure, rolling stock and cross-border coordination.

Edited by Gabe Bullard/VdV