NIGEL THOMPSON MARJORIE YUE Go Dutch at the double by train
Britain may be hurtling towards the Brexit door but my train is speeding at 186mph to a future where Europe is closer.
I am on a new £51million Eurostar e320 express for its preview run from London’s St Pancras International station directly to Amsterdam Centraal.
This 3hr 41min journey is the next stage in cross-Channel rail travel, which started in November 1994 with services from Waterloo to Paris and Brussels and added seasonal trains to Marseille in 2015.
It’s an exciting step forward for those who don’t want to fly. And the city centre-to-centre time makes it very competitive with airlines.
(Disclaimer: I accept if you live some way outside London this is not necessarily so and the plane will beat the train from Manchester, for example.) Apart from the speed and convenience, the tech on these new trains is right up there too.
Using the free wi-fi on this stateof-the-art, 900-seat loco, I can write this story on my laptop and file it straight to the Sunday Mirror office.
And I can post on social media or watch a movie via the on-board entertainment server. The new service calls first at Brussels (now in a record 1hr 46mins) and Rotterdam. It ran perfectly, but the big drawback is that the UK and Dutch governments have yet to agree immigration procedures at Amsterdam Centraal.
That treaty is unlikely to be signed until 2019 so, for now, you have to disembark in Brussels on the way back for passport control, adding around an hour to the trip.
Twice-daily services start on April 4, with attractive one-way fares from £35 on sale now. eurostar.com Berghaus men’s Hillmaster jacket, £220, berghaus.com
Laugh in face of foul weather with a new breathable GORETEX waterproof, available from March. Comes with six pockets, a peaked hood and double storm flap.