More On Liquid Exchange in Europe

If you feel uncomfortable reading about bathrooms, you may want to skip this particular post.

When leaving Zurich, we almost missed our train to Munich because I wanted to use the bathroom. The bathroom required 2 CHF (Swiss Francs), and we did not have any cash. What followed took well over 40 minutes. I first searched for an ATM machine, returning to the bathroom only to find that the change machine would not accept my 50 CHF bill. So after fruitlessly searching for a place to change the bill, I gave up and bought a pastry at a nearby shop. Only then was I able to finally enter the bathroom successfully.

My natural tendency to use the bathroom before getting on most forms of public transportation turned out to be just the wrong strategy in Europe. Train station bathrooms, while generally very nice, cost money. I thought prices were steep in Berlin’s Hauptbahnhof (€0.80), until I tried the train station in Florence (€1). In the meantime, the bathrooms on the train are usually clean, always free, and easy to find. Bathroom prices culminated in Venice where to use a public restroom costs €1.50. To add insult to injury, these bathrooms close at 7pm.

(Getting cash before getting on the direct train from Zurich to Munich turned out to be a good thing after all. The train passed through Austria, which was not covered by our Eurail pass, and the conductor only accepted cash.)