@jon Yes, we hung around at Freilassing for half an hour for the same reason. Our NightJet had left Wien 63 mins late, and nicely made up 30 mins by routing on the Neubaustrecke to Salzburg. Which was then lost. Shot in the dark here, but as we made Brussels Midi on time, I'm guessing that there might be a bit of slack in the timetable for crossing Germany.

@jon My impression also (despite the previous rant!). Decent rolling stock and timekeeping too.

@jon Money would be better spent on integration rather than infrastructure with bloated redundancy. In fact, reopening the single track line to Białowieża would be better as the National Park is of international interest. So whilst not cross border, more "near border" crap integration in the north east/east. Then again, Hajnówka does have two lovely new big platforms in case any trains might run through to Belarus again...not that passenger services have done for a very long time! (3 of 3)

@jon Particularly after being in Poland's far east on Thursday, where the bus from Białowieża (home of the primeval forest) neatly misses the train from Hajnówka (100 minutes gap) to Siedlce and Warsaw.
Hajnówka station is another farce with a bridge that leads to a foot crossing of the tracks, and the weirdness of random isolated stations around Czeremcha having very new and massively long platforms which will never see anything longer than a two car unit stopping there(2)

I also remember walking 1km over the border (from a bus from Zakopane) to Trstená to ride on bus driven by a comically grumpy bus driver. No one could get on until he reversed across the road and back!
Now we are in Austria, where the narrow gauge line to Mariazell has such beautifully organised integration and information it's enough to make one slightly damp eyed...
Lengthy rant warning!⚠️...(1)

@jon Just spoke to friends complaining about the millions being spent on the parallel motorway, as if money was no object.

@jon Ace. Worth checking out no- dig gardening https://charlesdowding.co.uk/ . Saves a lot of labour and time, especially if travelling a bit on the rails.

@jon Cheers, I think this is a neat idea, though I would have two water bottles to negotiate!

@jon Great, thanks! I'm interested to see how it would fix on my Tourer bike. (Our bike mechanic banned us from fixing D-locks to the frame!)