My big summer train trip is on – 9 European countries in 9 days – and I’m going to blog the heck out of it because, let’s face it, catching many, many trains in many, many different countries in such a short space of time can only be amusing at my expense, as I fail to understand the German for ‘the train to Prague now leaves from platform 2’ and end up in Bucharest instead.
But assuming all goes well, my plan is to send a dispatch from each European city en route. I’m going to call it ‘In & out – Berlin’, etc, etc, and the plan is to come up with one cool thing to do, one place to eat, and one place to have a drink or a coffee in each destination.
They may not be famous or iconic places – some will, some won’t – because that’s not how I travel. If you want ‘the 10 best things to do in Berlin’ then Google away, there are plenty of people out there who can help you.
Less than 24 hours in each place
I have less than 24 hours in each place because, for this trip, the travel by train is the point of my journey. I’m looking forward to seeing the continent roll by through a train window, daydreaming about life and travel and relaxing into that half-asleep-half-awake mode that rests upon you as the train wheels clatter through waving fields of wheat studded with poppies. I’m decidedly not going to be chasing around European capitals ticking off must-sees. What would be the point? Instead, I’m going to make a virtue of my limited time and choose just one thing to do – a walk, an offbeat sight, a random attraction – that, if you did it too, would still make you feel like you had experienced something real in that particular city.
I’ll add in a place to eat – I’ve done some research, but also hoping for serendipitous discoveries – and a bar or coffee house, and I reckon that’s all you really need for a day or less in any destination. If it helps you in the future, it was my pleasure; if you never get to any of these places, I hope you enjoy the vicarious ride. Buckle up!
Where am I going? Everywhere
And for a head’s up, this is where we will be visiting over the next ten days or so – Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Bratislava, Ljubljana, Zagreb, Zürich and Lichtenstein, and Milan.
(Don’t be confused by the map at the top of this post – I’d like to say that it was all my own work but, as it clearly shows all the wrong destinations, it’s blindingly obvious that I lifted it from Flickr.)
Anyway, if I do file a blog from Bucharest, it’s all gone terribly, terribly wrong.
See you in – and out – of Europe. I’ll be the one on the train, typing away.
This is going to be fun!
Image: Europe by Todd Huffman, Flickr, CC BY 2.0
'Jules Told Me' by Jules Brown 