by train
Some information on the train connections can be found at the airport website. There will be 2 parts of your trip: first,
from the airport to Warsaw Central (in Polish: from "Warszawa Lotnisko Chopina" to "Warszawa Centralna"), and second, from Warsaw to Toruń
(i.e from "Warszawa Centralna" to "Toruń Główny").
From the airport (Warszawa Lotnisko Chopina) to Warsaw (Warszawa
Centralna), you can either take "Koleje Mazowieckie" or "SKM Szybka
Kolej Miejska". From Warsaw (Warszawa Centralna) to Toruń (Toruń
Główny) you will go with "PKP Intercity". "Koleje Mazowieckie", "SKM
Szybka Kolej Miejska" and "PKP Intercity" are separate and independent
railway carriers, and from outside of Poland, it is not possible to
buy a single ticket for both parts of your trip. You will need
separate tickets, which you can either buy in separate ticket offices,
at ticket machines, or online.
Once you arrive at Chopin Airport, make your way to the train terminal. Then buy a ticket to "Warszawa
Centralna" either from the ticket machine or from the ticket office.
The simplest option is to buy a standard Warsaw transport system (ZTM)
ticket which you can use either on an SKM train
or "Koleje Mazowieckie".
A ZTM/SKM ticket ("single fare transfer ticket") should cost around 4.40 PLN (which is around 1 €); this ticket is valid for 75 minutes after stamping (the actual travel time is about 20 minutes).
For Koleje Mazowieckie (the standard is a bit better than SKM, with more space for luggage), you can in principle buy a specifically "KM"
ticket, which will cost you around 7 PLN (slightly less than
2 €) for the same travel.
Trains of both sorts leave from a single platform — check the info panels.
An SKM S3 train or a KM train will include a stop at "Warszawa Centralna", where many people
will get off. You can also choose an SKM S2 train, but in that case you will have to get off at
"Warszawa Śródmieście" instead (at "Warszawa Śródmieście", exit west, walk about 50 m west,
and go through another 50 or so of tunnels to get into "Warszawa Centralna").
On the train you must punch your ticket in a ticket punching machine. Some KM
trains might not have ticket punching machines, in which case you are expected to search for
a train conductor to stamp your ticket without waiting for him/her to come to you.
Once you get to Warszawa Centralna you will take a train to Toruń
Główny [best travel time with no changes: 2h50m; with one change: about 3h15m].
You may buy a ticket from one of several ticket offices at Warszawa Centralna
(showing a printout of
your chosen travel plan can help overcome the language barrier),
but if you are
comfortable with a personally identified train ticket, then we
recommend that you buy it online via this PKP website.
The earliest you can buy a ticket online is 30 days before the
travel begins, and you can still do this up to about an hour before
departure. Online ticket purchase is unavailable between 23:00 and
01:00 (PL time; UTC+2 in summer)—you cannot buy tickets online
during this 2-hour period. The online ticket will be issued for you
personally (unlike the one from the ticket office, which does not have
any personal identifying data on it). You will need to print the
ticket and carry this with you or store the image of the QR
code on your mobile or laptop). During ticket control in the
train, if you have
a personalised ticket (with your name on it),
the conductor will ask you for proof of ID. Since the
conductor's English may be less than fluent, you can accelerate the
procedure by showing the printout of your ticket together with your
ID/passport. If you buy a ticket from the ticket office, the ticket will not have your name on it and you will not be asked to show any ID.
Lateness error margin: Expect 5–15 minutes' delay at about 1σ; allow
for 60–90 minutes' delay at about 2σ.
Once you arrive in Toruń Główny, we recommend taking
a taxi which has a sign on the top showing a number in the series
1-9191, 1-9192, ... 1-9199
to get to your hotel.
The taxi fare should be around 20–25 PLN (about 5 €)
[typical travel time to University Hotel: 5 mins driving, 5 mins traffic lights; travel time to Old Town: less than that!].
Taxis identified with any other number or without a number
are not recommended and will cost you a lot more.
Alternatively, bus 27 will take you
very cheaply from Toruń Główny to the University Hotel, provided that you can buy a ticket from the driver
or a machine on the bus and get off at the bus stop "Grunwaldzka" (or get off immediately after crossing the bridge
and you'll be 20 m from the Old Town).
However, if plainclothes ticket inspectors board the bus with you, you may have only about 15–30 seconds to punch a floppy ticket in the ticket machine while the bus is accelerating and braking like a roller coaster; once the ticket machines are frozen, you'll be considered guilty of having travelled without a valid ticket if you were too slow! A crowded bus is no protection: ticket inspectors quite happily squeeze through sardine-packed buses.
If you are fit and have a comfortable backpack and the weather is nice, you can walk west about 500 m
from Toruń Główny to a bridge crossing the Vistula River and get a good view of the river with a 1 km
walk across the bridge to the Old Town.
by bus
You might find complementary travel times and buy
a bus ticket online
to travel from "Warszawa Zachodnia" (e.g. DW.ZACHODNI in the search box) to
the Toruń "PKS" inter-town bus exchange
[typically 3–4 hours]. You can buy a ticket from the
driver if you are lucky enough that a free seat is still available. If
you buy a ticket online (or from the ticket office if you are lucky),
and there are many people waiting for the bus, then you may need to
use your elbows to get to the front. The bus driver will first let
people with tickets enter the bus. If you do not enter the bus together
with those passengers,
the bus driver may sell the remaining seats, so if you are late or do
not use your elbows to get up front then you might not be admitted to the
bus.
You first need to travel from Warsaw Chopin Airport as above towards Warszawa Centralna, but get off one stop earlier: Warszawa Zachodnia. Exit through the tunnel on the south side of the train station, and walk 50 m or so west around the train station building to find the bus station building. The buses are at the west side. Identify your bus by the bus company name, the destination (usually a town more distant than Toruń), grep the printed timetables by eye (not easy: there are many!), and/or ask locals.