Inter Rail Mega trip 2022

[cambsy]

Im thinking of getting a 1st class, continuous 15 day Inter Rail pass, as birthday present, sometime later in the year. I am in the very early stages of planning, and so far, am thinking of doing something, along the lines of London-Narvik(inside Arctic circle), the head over to Germany, Switzerland-Austria, then Poland-Slovakia, maybe more into Eastern Europe, depending on Ukraine situation, then head over to Italy, then if time to Spain, before heading home. I’d plan to use overnight trains and a couple or so nights in hotels, with travelling pretty much all day, every day.

So id like ideas and advice on,

What’s it like sharing a couchette or sleeper on the continent, with complete stranger? And is using the seating accommodation a false economy etc, Like Man In Seat61 says?

Any recommended routes or journeys to do? And interesting traction etc? Im open to any good ideas and advice.

Is my basic plan and idea, reasonable to do, or will i be pushing myself too hard to do anything like this? Will i knacker myself trying to cover this much of Europe?

Would one use hotels or hostels on a trip like this?.


Im thinking of doing basically, a big circle of Europoe, visiting several countries i been to before and really like, Germany-Switzerland and Austria, and visiting others i really want to see, Sweden-Norway, Eastern Europe, Italy and Spain, and if spare time, any other recommended countries or places. Im in very early stages of thinking and planning trip, so keen on advice, of what to do and see.

 

[dutchflyer]

go to community.eurail.com for more info-specific for what trains etc. But do not expect expert train-haulage or rail-fan advice
The grand treat would have been the full 3 monthes-as so many USA college students on a ´grand tour´ do.
NOte also that in some cases countries still do not allow sharing beds/couchette with strangers due to covid distancing-but this may fall rapidly
It is the same as in a hoStel-will also have multi bed rooms. But fairly often as a single you will share with a group or family who will take say 3 or 4 beds from the 6.
And again; ESpana as very worst, then France and ITaly as 2 and 3 for making life difficult for passholders; all these pesky reservations etc.
Seat/bed: seat61 is mostly aiming-he does not really visit the eurail, but always the tripadvisor, where mostly unclued Americans ask and ask the same all the time again- the better heeled and staying in Hiltons crowd. That also influences opinions. But likely you also have no idea what a seat in some countries may mean-there are still the situp + beg types with 8 sharing a compartment here and there. In most cases in a seat its slightly better as sit in an airplane seat on a night-flight: slightly more room and most often less crowded.

 

[Bald Rick]

I did London to Narvik (via Puttgarden train ferry, Copenhagen, Stockholm), then to Munich via Bodø, Trondheim, Copenhagen and Berlin 30 years ago. We did it in 10 days with 6 overnight trains. Didn’t see much of where we were! Some parts of the journey will be quicker now, but some may not be.

if you are older than about 30, I recommend against the overnight seats.

 

[30907]

if you are older than about 30, I recommend against the overnight seats.

Even in my early 20s, seats were only tolerable if I could lie down (easier then than now). Sharing couchettes was perfectly normal then, and (where permitted) should be no problem now. Careful with valuables though.

The one incident I recall was boarding a couchette in Germany with a fellow-traveller, and being barred from the compartment for some minutes by the older gent whose wife was going to bed in her (substantial IIRC!) underwear

That apart - even if you are very much younger than me, take it easy, otherwise you will nod off in the middle of some spectacular scenery... I recommend max 2 consecutive nights on board!

My suspicion is that you won't find time for Spain - in one way a shame, but it's off-route, and compulsory reservations all the way.

As to routes - it depends what your tastes are! Remember that Poland and N Germany are flat, and Northern Sweden goes on for hours...

 

[rvdborgt]

Remember that Poland and N Germany are flat,

People can see who's coming to visit tomorrow

Northern Sweden goes on for hours...

I remember lots of short trees, tall trees, thick trees, thin trees...

 

[MarcVD]

Been there, done that. Went to several places like Edinburgh, Oslo, Lisbon, Agrigento, Athens (twice), Istanbul, Moscow. And then further to Marrakech, Tehran, Beijing, Taskent. I did some of my trips in single sleeper compartments, but it does not exist everywhere. Never had problems with sharing. See it as an opportunity to meet people. I traveled from Moscow to Taskent 6 years ago with an Usbek fellow I still correspond with today.

I never did overnight trips in seating accommodation. And today (next trip will be to Porto this summer, I'm afraid long distance eastern destinations will be for another life, I'll never get a chance anymore to practice my russian again) I tend not to use overnight trips anymore unless absolutely necessary. My main goal is to observe railway rolling stock and infrastructure, and you can't do that when it's dark outside. So it's kind of 6AM to 10PM journeys with a night in an hotel as close as possible to the station in between. Slower, more expensive, but I get more return from my trips like that.

Example of trip I did without overnight trains in 2017 :
Day 1 Brussels Zurich (trains from Belgium to Switzerland still existed back then)
Day 2 Zurich Budapest (Railjet in Business class - whow !)
Day 3 Budapest Craiova (Romania)
Day 4 Craiova Sofia (over the new Danube bridge)
Day 5 Sofia Thessaloniki (all by train - no busstitution on the Greek part of the trip)
Day 6 Thessaloniki Athens (still partly via the old line)

And then a flight to Tel Aviv, my final destination, because no more ferries between Piraeus and Haifa...)

Don't try to do too much mileage but ensure you catch the most from the miles you will get.

 

[The exile]

Never had any issues (other than the slight trepidation of "what's it going to be like) with sharing. The advantage of the couchette is that you're much more likely to be sharing with several people who are not only strangers to you but also to each other - increases the "minor nuisance" likelihood but probably decreases the likelihood of anything worse.

Things to consider:
Depending on your age, it's more knackering in reality than on paper, especially if you're relying on potentially dodgy connections.
I never plan too many (what's too many?) rail overnights in succession - the "night in a real bed with proper shower etc" not only helps recharge the batteries [principally your own, but also various devices!], but puts in a useful bit of elasticity which can be sacrificed if things go really wrong and you're running a day late). If you're going to be travelling all day as well, the weather is less relevant, but while whiling away whole days on end between overnight trains is OK / tolerable when it's warm and sunny, it can get pretty miserable when it's cold and wet (and so are you!).

 

[SandsofEss]

I recently took a trip from the Baltic to the Adriatic coast, so I can share a little bit of insight here.

Bar a few day trips our route was Gdansk (Poland) > Krakow > Zakopane > Tatranska Lomnica (Slovakia) > Kosice > Bratislava > Vienna (Austria) > Ljubljana (Slovenia) > Trieste (Italy) > Venice. We really enjoyed each town we visited, and would happily go back.

Domestic Polish and Slovakian sleeper trains are excellent value, and very comfortable. We rode on the 'Rozewie' from Gdansk to Krakow, and EN442 / RR 704 from Kosice to Bratislava.

An interesting way to get between Poland and Slovakia is to take the train up into Zakopane (pretty town on the Polish side of the High Tatras mountains), and then a bus across the border to Tatranska Lomnica (the same but for Slovakia). From there you can pick up the Tatran Electric Railway, either to explore the Tatras further (strongly recommended) or to head down into the plain.

Kosice (Slovakia's second city) is well worth visiting, and from there it's easy to head directly south into Hungary if you're keen. Our route via Vienna meant we could ride EC 151 'Emona' over the Semmering Pass, which was on the bucket list for me.

Both Slovakia and Slovenia are utterly beautiful, and we found the people extremely welcoming.

Oh, and a faux pas I made. Many Polish, Slovakian and Slovenian people consider their nations Central Europe, not Eastern Europe.

Happy to answer any more specific questions about my itinerary if it helps with your planning.

Otherwise, just a word of encouragement to "Go for it"! We did our trip with three children all aged under 12, so some nerves beforehand, but we now all agree it was the most exciting adventure we'd ever had and we're already planning the next one.

 

[Fragezeichnen]

I’d plan to use overnight trains and a couple or so nights in hotels, with travelling pretty much all day, every day.
Is my basic plan and idea, reasonable to do, or will i be pushing myself too hard to do anything like this? Will i knacker myself trying to cover this much of Europe?

It's up to you what your aims, but I would advise against this approach. What's the point in visiting all these places if you never see anything of them further than you can walk to whilst waiting for your next train?

Bear in mind too that a lot of people find it difficult to actually sleep well on sleeper trains. The "beds" in a Couchette car are basically long seats, not matresses . The air conditioning can sometimes be noisy or ineffective, as can the track noise. I usually wear earplugs. So continous night train travel can be a recipe for sleep deprivation.

It depends on the individual - personally I try to avoid consecutive overnights, on the other hand there are people that quite happily do an entire 2 week trip entirely on sleeper trains.

What’s it like sharing a couchette or sleeper on the continent, with complete stranger? And is using the seating accommodation a false economy etc, Like Man In Seat61 says?

Couchettes are generally mixed gender(some operators have female only compartments) and you keep your clothes on, Sleeping cars have gender segregated compartments so you can undress.
I've rarely had any issues sharing. On overnight trains which depart in the early evening it can be quite sociable, since couchette travellers are predominately young people on some kind of "adventure" who are keen to chat, share food etc. Business travellers, families etc. tend to go in the Sleeping car.

Personally I avoid seating overnights if at all possible(on some routes in Eastern Europe, a seating only overnight train is literally the only train at all), because it's even harder to sleep than a couchette.

Would one use hotels or hostels on a trip like this?.

It's up to you. I love the social and informal aspect of hostels. Other people much prefer to have a bit of privacy, a more professional and predicatble stay, and no risk of sharing with someone who snores all night

 

[43096]

It's up to you what your aims, but I would advise against this approach. What's the point in visiting all these places if you never see anything of them further than you can walk to whilst waiting for your next train?

Bear in mind too that a lot of people find it difficult to actually sleep well on sleeper trains. The "beds" in a Couchette car are basically long seats, not matresses . The air conditioning can sometimes be noisy or ineffective, as can the track noise. I usually wear earplugs. So continous night train travel can be a recipe for sleep deprivation.

It depends on the individual - personally I try to avoid consecutive overnights, on the other hand there are people that quite happily do an entire 2 week trip entirely on sleeper trains.

Agreed on avoiding too many overnights. For the OP, it's also worth bearing in mind that you can base yourself in a city for a few days and can get surprisingly far on a day trip out and back especially as train speeds have increased over the years. As examples, staying in Vienna, you can easily get well into Slovakia, Czechia or Hungary and back in a day. Or if, as I was, you get messed around by British Airways cancelling flights back from Vienna when you're staying in Brno, it was easy enough to get to Munich for a different flight going via Vienna and then RailJet to Munich (and a couple of stop-offs on the way).