Five Things You Need To Travel By Train Abroad

My Top Tips As A Frequent Traveller

Lausanne: my photo

As a student I used to travel backwards and forwards from Cambridgeshire to the North West by train every week.

Spending hours in packed carriages, stopping off at Birmingham New Street for snacks and getting caught up in long delays, I was never put off from travelling by rail.

In fact I loved it.

But I didn’t take my first train into Europe until much later on.

About ten years ago I decided to take a short break to Paris using the Eurostar.

Since then I haven’t looked back.

Most of my holidays start on the Eurostar these days.

To get further afield I take the double decker trains and high speed TGV trains too.

So in this article I would like to share some useful tips that will help you to make travelling by train more relaxed.

These are simple hacks that make life easier when going into Europe.

Top Tip 1

It is great to use your phone to store train tickets but make sure you don’t leave them snuggled in your email inbox.

Take a photo of your tickets and store them in your Apple Wallet, if possible.

That way, if the train goes into a dead spot between two mountains and the conductor wants to see your ticket, you can produce it straight away, without depending on the Wifi.

Top Tip 2

Leave enough time to make train connections. When using the Trainline app or a similar site to book tickets, they often leave very short times to get off of one train and onto another.

Although this makes the journey look faster, if there is a slight delay you end up running across platforms hoping to wave at the driver and stop the train.

Then you have the disappointment of missing the connection.

It is better to leave an hour or so between trains and take those stops as opportunities to explore the stations and surroundings or just stretch your legs and grab a coffee.

Top Tip 3

Get onto the train as soon as you can. Despite plenty of shelving for cases, there will always be people who bring more than their fair share of baggage and take up all of the storage space available,

They will also nick your overhead storage if you are not quick enough at utilising that.

Inside the Golden Pass train to Gstaad (my photo)

Top Tip 4

Keep the things you need most often in your hand luggage.

The last thing you want to do is start lifting other people’s suitcases off of yours in order to rummage through your stuff to find a charger or a book.

Chargers, inhalers, suncream, books and personal items that you are likely to need fast access to should be in your hand luggage, ideally stored above your seats.

Top Tip 5

Be organised.

Make use of apps that could make your holiday run smoothly.

For example, I use the Fork app to prebook tables at restaurants. It means than when I arrive in a new city, I can rest assured that there will be a table waiting for me and it will probably have a discount involved.

Similarly, the Get Your Guide app is brilliant when booking walking tours, hop on and off buses and boat trips.

Having some activities booked in advance can be reassuring. You can then spend the rest of your time falling in love with every destination, having organised your itinerary while sipping wine on a comfortable train.

Final Thought

My Medium focuses on writing, reading and travel by train and so I hope to be able to help readers appreciate these aspects of modern life.

Perhaps one of my tips will come in useful the next time that you decide to travel by train.

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I really appreciate you stopping by to read about my suggestions.