El trazado de la 'Y' vasca quedará culminado este año después de dos décadas de obras | El Correo El TAV empezará a circular en 2030 si se ejecuta a tiempo la estación provisional de Basauri y se reforma la de Vitoria

Expected in 2030. Most of the works should finish this year, but the entry into Bilbao (initially a temporary station) and Vitoria is still pending. www.elcorreo.com/bizkaia/traz...

Ik heb in Kemi een jaar geleden twee dagen doorgebracht, en het enige restaurant dat iets waard was was dat van het hotel Merihovi

I don't know but they could use any electric broad gauge stock - including S-120 and S-130. And S-730 to Almería, as is the case normally.

Not currently; the line from Antequera towards Algeciras is closed for works most of the year.

These are regular services that will be complemented by the extra services of Renfe. www.renfe.com/es/es/grupo-...

Renfe has set out their alternative transport plan, including bus replacement for the 72 km between Villanueva de Córdoba and Córdoba, and between Madrid and Seville, Cádiz and Granada with additional services over the classical lines: www.renfe.com/es/es/grupo-...

Other alternatives are long-distance buses, carsharing, rental cars and flights.

If you have the time though, the line through Despeñaperros is quite scenic.

All these work, I think, daily in both directions, except the Zafra-Huelva service. They're quite a lot slower than the high speed services.

Renfe is working on alternative transport, but it's understandably not their priority. This will possibly include extra trains and buses

3️⃣ MD Madrid-Mérida-Sevilla, direct but slow (8 hours). Limited connections towards Huelva in Zafra¹

4️⃣ Intercity "Torre del Oro" Barcelona-Cádiz, passing through Valencia, Alcázar de San Juan, Córdoba and Sevilla.
Alcázar de San Juan can be reached from Madrid using a MD bound for Jaén.

1️⃣ Intercity Madrid-Almería. Switch in Guadix for Granada.

2️⃣ MD Madrid-Alcázar de San Juan-Jaén (4hrs).
Switch in Jaén for Córdoba (2 hrs), Sevilla (4 hrs) or Cádiz (6hrs).
Switch again in Córdoba for high-speed services to Seville (0h50) and Málaga (1h10).

As the high speed line is closed for the time being, there are currently only limited options to reach Andalucía by train

The following trains still run, as they use the classical lines to Andalucía:

Nogal aangedaan door het ongeluk op de HSL tussen Madrid en Andalusië. Vandaag best veel gedacht aan de mensen in die treinen, en hun familie, vrienden en collega's

Alleen Tanger en Fez, dus moet nog terugkomen 😁

My preferred route to/from Madrid involves the international AVE's, and one of the direct TGV's between Brussels and Nîmes/Lyon/Avignon.

By the way, the AVE's are now on sale until Sunday for travel up to August!
Madrid-Montpellier/Nîmes €29
Madrid-Marseille €39
Barcelona-Lyon €39

Fregenal de la Sierra's station is only served by 3 northbound and 3 southbound services a week (Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays)

The line between Jabugo and Zafra is only served 3 times a week per direction, but there were nonetheless a couple of passengers using it.

We also toured a bit around Spain by train, including the recently reopened Huelva-Zafra line. One of the disadvantages of travelling in winter is the limited daylight, even in Spain.

Almería's Intercity towards Madrid is very scenic. Unfortunately it currently gets dark before we reached the Despeñaperros gorge, but the Tabernas desert and the Sierra Nevada views are also scenic

The Volcán de Timanfaya in Melilla, loading trucks

Of the ferries I've taken, this is the first time a tug has been involved.

Sunset over the Mediterranean

Ferries go from both Melilla and Beni Nsar (Nador) to Almería, Motril and Málaga. We took the 5h30 ferry to Almería, as that was a daytime crossing. Contrary to the 30-km Gibraltar strait, here the distance is about 180 km.

The corridor between Moroccan and Spanish border controls to enter Melilla

From Beni Nsar, we crossed into Melilla, one of the Spanish exclaves in North Africa.

Moroccan exit check took 50 mins, spent queuing in the pouring rain. Then a caged corridor leads you to the Spanish border check (took 2 mins). We were told queues can take even longer, up to multiple hours

The Neptuno seats are Baleària's first class. During their Black Friday sale, the upgrade was free, but otherwise it's not worth much.

Passport entry controls for Morocco are done on board, which is somewhat efficient but we did spend 45 minutes in the on-board queue for that, leaving us less than 15 minutes to enjoy our Neptuno seats.

Our Baleària ferry on the Tarifa-Tanger Ville route

Getting to Morocco is fairly easy. The best crossing seem to be the 1-hour Tarifa-Tanger Ville ferry services, which arrives in Tanger's city centre. Tarifa is a 45 minute public bus ride from Algeciras, though the ferries (Baleària in any case) provide free shuttle services too.

An Electric locomotive with an Al Atlas service in Kenitra

Our loco-hauled service between Fès and Beni Nsar, which is not electrified. The locomotive was switched in Fès.

In Taourirt the train stops for a while to move the locomotive to the other side, to head North towards Nador.

The train is composed of a mixed of open plan and 8-person compartment carriages in second class, and a single first class carriage with 6-seat compartments.

From Kenitra we headed East towards Fès and later on continued towards Beni Nsar (Nador's port) on Al Atlas services: loco-hauled corail carriages.

They currently run over the 186 km high speed line which has been built between Tanger and Kenitra, where we left the train. From here they continue over the classical line towards Casa.

Works have started last year to extend the high speed line all the way to Marrakech, expected by 2030.

Two Al Boraq sets in Tanger Ville

One of the notable differences with the SNCF sets is that these only have 2 instead of 3 first class coaches.

The interior - pictured here in first class - is nearly identical to the SNCF Euroduplex. They don't have wifi though.

Morocco can be quite easily reached from Spain, but I'd never taken the trains there. So it was time to try them out, starting with the Al Boraq. This is their high speed service between Tanger and Casablanca. These TGV Euroduplex feel very familiar: they're very similar to SNCF's.

Zelf een paar keer best goedkoop in Glasgow overnacht, maar misschien niet in het voorjaar

Eurostar has a new (I think) option in their Snap booking platform: unallocated seats on their Paris-Brussels and Brussels-Amsterdam services. A bit more expensive than their Snap fares, but you do know the train you're assigned.

Geen treinen tussen Geldermalsen en Den Bosch tot zondag Volgens ProRail is de schade aan het spoor enorm en moet er onder meer een kilometer spoor en wissel worden vernieuwd.

De aanrijding: nos.nl/artikel/2588...

The morning TGV from Paris to Barcelona (07:41-14:29; 6h48) with a 18 minute stop in Montpellier-Sud de France

The evening TGV from Paris to Barcelona (14:41-21:29; 6h48) with a 6 minute stop in Montpellier-St Roch

Up to now, I've avoided Sud de France due to its difficult connection, aided by the fact that only the morning TGV's to/from Barcelona stop there.

The contournement of Nîmes and Montpellier makes no difference to the scheduled journey time from Paris to Barcelona because of an 18 min stop in SdF

"Il fallait réparer cette anomalie" : Le tram arrive enfin à la nouvelle Gare Sud de France à Montpellier Elle avait été inaugurée sous le mandat de Philippe Saurel en juillet 2018. Depuis, les Montpelliérains attendaient la connexion d'un tram, à la nouvelle gare Sud de France depuis 7 ans. Ce samedi 18 ...

Montpellier's tram line 1 extension to Montpellier Sud de France was opened yesterday! france3-regions.franceinfo.fr/occitanie/he...

Lijkt waarschijnlijk, want de klasse-upgrade weekend is sinds kort ook niet meer te koop op vrijdagavond (online of in de app, heb zelf niet gekeken op een automaat).