We checked out of the hotel and got to Berlin Central Train Station at about 9:30 am and waited by track #12 for the 9:52 train to Warsaw.
We were in an ICC train. It was between cities but not classed as an Express because we had a few stops. Interestingly, the stop before the border with Poland was in Frankfurt an der Oder. It was small and definitely not the city of Frankfurt most people associate with Germany!
Our compartment was for six passengers. During most of our journey there were only five. Jay sat next to Darth Vader girl, which of course is our name for her. The ladies by the windows were both older ladies who we were able to graciously help lift the heavy luggage they stored overhead. On the German side of the border we were checked by German staff and on the Polish side the staff changed. We only drank the free water bottles, although the dining car was about seven cars down from us. Actually, we had several sandwiches we'd made from excess supermarket supplies last night.
We noticed just how much of the land was flat and productive. The crops were verdant and the occasional group of silos proved that some of the crops were grains.
The train travelled at just around 100 mph during most sections. I have an app on my phone that measures speed using satellite calculation. It read 160 kph almost on the dot as the train glided over the tracks smoothly.
At just the right time of 3:30 pm, we stopped at the station in downtown Warsaw.
We hadn't looked up how we would get to our hotel here. Luckily, my phone data worked in Poland although I didn't buy a package from my provider, expressly as they didn't mention Poland in their literature. I find that Google Maps is really helpful in figuring out transit. I saw that we could go by tram or subway. We chose subway because it looked easier although there was quite a walk on both ends of the ride.
As we'd bought 24-hour tickets after we'd settled in the hotel, we went on the tram to learn how they work. We'd mistakenly bought more expensive tickets than we needed as we will only be travelling with Zone 1. Still, our transit passes for a whole day was less than $CA 9.00. I think Vancouver's multimodal one day passes are either $CA 12 or 14 nowadays!
We noticed that our hotel has a great restaurant, we wanted to get out and explore a little. We found a Turkish kebab place after we stumbled out of the tram. We ordered 'standard' plates and honestly it was more food than we needed and we got 'standard' size. Jay wasn't able to finish his fries. Food seems cheaper here than in Germany. Although part of the EU, Poland has not changed over to the Euro. We have to calculate how much things cost with an exchange app on my phone.
We are staying in another Ibis hotel here. It is pretty large as the receptionist said it has 333 rooms! It's comfortable and will prove easily located for exploring Warsaw.