My best memory is sleeping under the stars outside the train station of Biarritz, France, on a mild summer night next to the Atlantic Ocean. Such a refreshing sleep.
The next night we did the same, sleeping under the stars outside the train station of Modane, France, very high up in the Alps. Definitely didn't sleep as well with the cold air and weird looks.
I live in a seasonal touristy area and I have to do double-takes as to whether someone is transient, or is just backpacking.
The implication here is personal safety. The homeless individual could be unpredictable due to mental health, whereas the backpacker is likely to be neutral.
IIRC it was a ticket for 20 days of unlimited travel, which we had to cut short as a friend did get sunburnt so badly to require a hospital stay. Ah, the joys of youth.
As always, the most easy to reach places will have the most people. I would say that's not what you're going for in such a trip.
Great program for young people to learn more about other countries I made use of as well.
Is this not possible any more?
In Switzerland, some of the touristy intra-country routes (ex: Tirano-Chur, Interlaken-Lucerne) may require (a rather expensive) reservation.
But, as you get older, there's a certain joy in making plans in advance.
Am I the only one who feels the opposite? I used to take great care in making plans, knowing what's up ahead, knowing what I should know and so on. Spontaneous moments like "Lets go to X" were very infrequent. Nowadays, as a Proper Adult, I much more like going places without knowing anything about them, with as little plans as possible, figuring out what the place is from the people I meet there, and only start reading about the place once I'm there.
Yeah, same here, I guess that's why I'm opting for less planning, not more. I guess some people are just wired differently, that's what makes the world so interesting probably :)
France, Italy, Spain, Portugal & Sweden require seat reservations, as do most international services
Making reservations varies from easy to a complete pain
It’s fine for commuter stuff, of course, but I assume that’s the case everywhere.
For example in Hungary we have an unlimited pass for ~53€ a month, valid on all trains and multiple public transport options (almost everything in Budapest included) https://bkk.hu/en/tickets-and-passes/prices/hungary-pass-ful...
Whereas a 3 days in 1 month Interrail pass is 79€ https://www.interrail.com/en/interrail-passes/one-country-pa...
I think this would be more for people that are doing a many week (3 or more) trip. At that point I think most people would want to see more than 1 country in Europe as they're so different
This deserves a little more unpicking.
Something that I hear very few people discuss is that not all holidays are equal and you need to be aware of what you really need before choosing.
If you want to see new places, people, cultures, food, whatever - that's one thing. But if you're tired and need to recharge (sadly, this was often my experience in a corporate job - an endless sawblade cycle of work -> recharge -> work -> recharge) then don't go interrailing - go somewhere quiet and plan to sleep and lie around for a week or two. City breaks and events (e.g. festivals, sports, etc.) fall into this category for me - they are fun and make life better, but expect to come home hopefully happier but also tireder than when you went.
Meanwhile, I'm about to spend ten days in the french mountains, and I hope to do nothing more than read books and go for long quiet walks.
Wanted to do a write-up like this, but only got as far as the map,
https://kenschutte.com/europe-2023/
I wonder if they took the new "Rail Baltica" through the Baltics? That was one of weaker links in the train route - I used a bus between Vilnius and Riga.
I spent weeks and weeks traveling around the US. The Amtrak system is much maligned but you get to move at a slow pace and see the country and meet people (some of which you would prefer to have not met).
I highly recommend doing it if you want to get a sense of the scale and diversity of the US.
During this trip, at the recommendation of a friend, I read (or tried to read) a number of "American classic" books which I would finish and then leave on the train for someone else to read. Catch in the Rye, Huckleberry Finn, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Great Gatsby, ... The only book I couldn't finish was, ironically, On The Road which I found utterly tedious.
Edit: global passes let you travel everyday of your pass, with passes of up to 3 months: https://www.interrail.com/en/interrail-passes/global-pass
When I returned from Germany, two months ago, the lady next to me was amazed that I payed Munchen-Verona 37€ while she did 100+.
EDIT: found it https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48889922
Just doesn't trigger me, I have seen the non-touristy parts of those countries on my journey and neither the hate nor the hype rings a bell. It's one of those low-key super successful government stuff. Maybe something like that should exist on global scale.
Would certainly change things, e.g. the US looked far less glamorous when I actually visited it*, but there's a lot more variation in certain parts of the world than between nearby parts of continental Europe, e.g. Nairobi not only had some very nice looking newly built stuff (the first pictures for the city on Google Maps seem to be glamour shots), but also this: https://www.google.de/maps/place/Nairobi,+Kenya/@-1.2442837,...
* landed at SFO, even just the literal bed in the hotel room was larger than some entire rooms I've stayed in, then I look out of the windows and think "1980s parody of Butlins in 1960" ("Hi-de-Hi!" was part of my childhood TV).
That wouldn't surprise me. "your worst train experience" still would, unless the person only taken trains in Europe. But the world is big, and some places are just on a different level. Ever taken a train in India? I'd like to hear those people complain about the German train experience :)
If you expect a comfortable and quiet experience, then I’d agree with you, Germany can be a much nicer experience.
So it’s really about what you value, I guess
I won't defend DB too much here but saying that 64% of trains in germany are delayed more than 15min is just plain wrong. The official statistics put it at 40% for 6min or more for long distance trains and 11% for regional trains in 2025[1]. I think if there would be 15min statistics, DB would be on a sinilar level to India for long-distance. Not something to be proud of, but not as desastrous as you paint it. Though, maybe I misunderstood? Do you have sources for the indian numbers?
[1] https://eisenbahn.de/geramond-vgb/jahresbilanz-2025-puenktli...
German train delays are not a big blocker because you normally plan a whole day train travel to go from A to B and being one or two hours late is not too bad.
With Interrail, that is doable. You’ll have to mostly plan for overnight stays in large cities, but that’s what most Interrail users want to, anyways.
Seems more like parent did Intrarail to me.
“Interrail One Country Pass allows unlimited rail travel within one participating country, excluding the holder’s country of residence.”
It’s a way of reinforcing eu identity.. they call it interrail because it connects you to other cultures or societies or whatever you want to call it
Quick one-off jokes that commentators on HN take way to literally and start a whole diatribe about? I mean, apparently :D Relax, it's only a joke, I have no issues with Interrail and use it myself from time to time too... Not sure I'd agree it has anything to do with European or EU identity, but anyways, I guess some do :)
One of the things that always bothered me because it's such an arbitrary rule and has hugely different effects for people from different countries. Like, people from Switzerland or Belgium can easily move around all over the place after a short domestic trip. For a few lucky fellers from Lichtenstein or Luxemburg the rule is practically non-existent on account of the small sizes of their countries, whereas someone from eastern France has to pay for a long-distance ticket across all of France if they want to explore the western part of Europe, and all they get is Spain and Portugal (and Andorra—do they have a train line?) with no way to visit Scandinavia, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Austria, Czechia, Slovenia or Germany without having to pay for a cross-country trip through France a second time.
Also the age limitation for European citizens whereas non-Europeans have no such limit.
I wish to see high speed maglev transportation to supplant air travel in my lifetime.
Other countries I'm familiar with (Spain, France, Germany, UK, Japan) certainly do let you turn up, buy a ticket, and get on. It will cost more than buying earlier.
That's a bit presumptuous...
The whole text is full of these weird takes on the most banal things.
I've seen tourists in London marvel at the most commonplace thing - and I think that's delightful.
yeah that got me . not sure specifically but it felt a bit weird. Also I appreciate this post is about the interrailing, but it felt after reading all the y did was catch trains for the duration, but no mention of anything that they did or saw in all these places.
The in southern Europe (e.g. France, Spain, Italy), required seat reservation is most common and most expensive.
I don't mind requiring seat reservations, but that it is separate from the ticket price and significant (eg 15€/seat reservation in Italy), feels like price gouging. It also feels different from say the optional (and way lower priced seat reservations in German ICE's (high speed rail)). I rather pay for a "high speed rail supplement" instead of seat reservation haha :).
I interrailed last year through Germany, Austria, Slovenia, Italy and Switzerland.
In Germany I was lucky, I only had a small delay on the way back.
Austria was exceptional in everything. On time, modern trains and facilities. I guess the food on the train was expensive and bland, but I've never seen a train where that's different.
Slovenia was the weirdest and had the most delays. Train cars for which I had seat reservations consistently didn't exist or arrive. They use old stock, but that also made it kind of fun and there were great views. I couldn't rely on the time table though.
Italy has lots of high speed rail, but required (paid) seat reservations. The problem is that for almost any medium-long distance there's no slower speed alternative. The normal speed stock is fine (can be taken to go to smaller cities) and was generally on time.
Trains in Switzerland are exceptional too. Funnily enough, I did have fairly significant delays 2/5 times.
One has to add that most of the time when you buy a single ticket in Germany you have to (pay through the nose and) buy a ticket that is good for one specific train. Miss that train and your ticket is gone. This used to be different before the reform of the Deutsche Bahn after 1989; you used to buy a ticket for a 'communication' (connection between endpoints), not a specific train. TBF in like up to 200% of all cases Deutsche Bahn will route the wrong train in the wrong direction to a wrong station hours after the schedule in which case your Zugbindungsfahrausweis will fall back to work as a pre-reform ticket valid on all trains in that direction (sometimes even including an upgrade if an ICE is all there is, I think).
There is this thing called “common sense” :)
Similarly - I was once on a train in Italy which stopped at a station with platforms shorter than the train. We discovered this when we opened the door to find a big step down onto gravel. That's not something that happens in the UK.
The biggest difference of course is that the UK has much higher train doors. So an open door without a platform is very high off the ground. Perhaps that's why we have a different culture around it.
https://international-railway-safety-council.com/safety-stat...
I’ve done Helsinki Talinn and that was great.
Think it was just your peer group then. It's still very much a thing. Did it in my youth twice, once at 16 years once at 18 around 2010. I know my cousin who is >10 years younger than me also did it sometime in the last 5 years. Among my peers it was fairly common but it was not done by the majority. If I'd have to guess I'd say 10-20% did it at some point towards the end of highschool.
We also did party trips but that's just a different kind of trip and doesn't really mean the other thing is dead.
Yes, very much still a thing. We saw Interrail travellers of all ages. Lots of students going on a big adventure - but a decent number of more experienced travellers seeing the sights.
https://www.interrail.com/en/magazine/did-you-know/rail-reca...
It’s actually more affordable via us, as prices are net and we do free refunds. Loosing the Stripe fee but it’s worth it.
Delay or cancellation compensation is different. You can then contact our support and we’ll help with making that claim.
Agreed. It's horrific. They need to get rid of some of the shops, knock through, and double or triple the size of the departure lounge. EES has made it even more chaotic.
We do this all the time in the UK - give too much space to retail. You can understand why though - we spend like crazy at airports and railway stations.
I did a first class Interrail earlier this year, not planning much, not staying in hostels. It was quite stressful as unsurprisingly Paris, Milan, Florence etc are popular and expensive places! Trying to chase good weather was annoying as it was a terrible winter in much Europe - we had all this flexibility but didn't want to go anywhere as everywhere was cloudy and rainy.
We ended up abandoning it half way through, when we were in southern Spain during the terrible week of multiple derailments. We aren't religious but we took that as a sign to head home
I'm still committed to trains but I wouldn't repeat the experience. I would base myself somewhere with good trains, stay somewhere a bit cheaper, and do day trips via train