Green Traveller's Guide to taking the train from London St Pancras International Railway Station to Gothenburg, West Sweden.
Journey Time: about 36 hours
Sample timetable: Depart London just after 11am, arrive Gothenburg at 6.20pm the following afternoon
Transfers: Four (all are convienient same-station platform changes, ie they don't require you have to cross the city) in Brussels, Cologne, Hamburg (where you stay overnight) and Copenhagen
Tickets provided by Trainline:
What's the journey like?
Take an early morning Eurostar to Brussels Midi station where there's an easy same-station platform change to board the high-speed Thalys or ICE trains to Cologne where again there's an easy same-station platform change you take another train to Hamburg where you stay overnight (we recently stayed at CAB 20, which is Level 3+ on Booking.com's Travel Sustainably initiative, it's about a 10-minute walk from the station). In the morning, catch the train to Copenhagen where you change trains for the final leg to Gothenburg, arriving at 6.20pm.
Keep an eye out on the platform at Brussels, Cologne and Hamburg for the handy guide to the layout of incoming trains, which shows you where your carriage will arrive into the station so you can make your way to the correct part of the platform before the train arrives.
Stopover hotels to break the journey in Brussels, Cologne or Hamburg
If you want to break the journey and stay overnight to see a bit more of Brussels, Cologne or Hamburg while you're travelling through, there are lots of lovely places to stay near Brussels Midi, Cologne and Hamburg railway stations. Here are hotels conveniently nearby:
Hotels near Brussels Midi; Hotels near Cologne Central station; Hotels near Hamburg station.
Hotels near Hamburg's train station
Miss your connection?
Don’t panic. Railteam’s ‘Hop on the Next Available Train’ service means that if you have missed your connection on a high-speed train because of a delay on the preceding high-speed leg of your journey, you’ll automatically be put on the next available high-speed train.
On arrival in Gothenburg
There's a wonderful hotel opposite the railway station - Hotel Eggers. For other places to stay as well as lots of information on travelling around West Sweden, see our Green Traveller's Guide to West Sweden and our guide to Climate Smart Holidays in West Sweden.
For more train routes in Europe, see Green Traveller's Flight-Free Train & Ferry Journey Planner