Protests outside of Paris Est this evening - with news of the Nightjets to Vienna and Berlin potentially being axed due to reduced funding from SNCF, it would seem the community’s come together to send them a message… @seatsixtyone.bsky.social

Breaking: Paris-Vienna, Paris-Berlin (and therefore possibly Brussels-Vienna) Nightjet sleeper trains under threat. www.hourrail.voyage/en/blog/trai...

The #Railway200 exhibition train ‘Inspiration’ is on tour across Britain and it’s free. Check the locations & book your visit 👇🏻 I’m booked to see it in - *checks notes* - Glasgow. Well why not? railway200.co.uk/inspiration/...

All in a day’s work for a Eurostar train manager…

Sale of SailRail tickets from British rail stations to Dublin have been suspended by Transport for Wales (who manage it for all train operators), possibly until December, due to ferry timing shenanigans while repairs to Holyhead's deepwater berths continue: tfw.wales/ways-to-trav...

Tomorrow, open-access operator RegioJet launches a daily lo-cost Warsaw-Krakow train. Look at those prices and weep (then realise that €16.30 Business class one includes complimentary fizz & Illy coffee and bawl your eyes out...)

Caledonian Sleeper have an offer on for Autumn/Winter on their Highlands routes: www.sleeper.scot/200/. Might be the time to try out the sleeper! More about the sleeper at www.seat61.com/sleeper-to-s...

For your next pub quiz: “Name a European station served by 3 different track gauges.”

Apparently, the @EuropeanSlpr is a potent, high-performance machine… www.msn.com/en-us/autos/...

Looks delicious - I’ll add this restaurant to the Venice page!

Seat selection is finally possible for the 'Ouigo Train Classique' between Brussels & Paris, with the ability to select an 'XL' seat in the first class car - which makes this option far more attractive! Brussels-Paris from €10, or first class from €17. www.seat61.com/internationa...

The dreaded last-minute Eurostar set swap isn’t always bad…

Great camouflage! Never really realised how great. (Yes, I should probably cut the grass - maybe next week…)

I've now fully updated the Bucharest/Sofia to Istanbul page with new photos and account of the journey, with details of the new border process at Edirne rather than Kapikule. www.seat61.com/trains-and-r... - as always, feedback welcome! What have I missed?

I've just completed a revised guide to Halkali, Sirkeci & Sogutlucesme stations in Istanbul, www.seat61.com/stations/ist... - and am now temporarily exhausted. Feedback welcome!

"Gemini Trains, in partnership with the ride-hailing company, wants to bring cross-Channel services to Stratford International in east London for the first time" and will also serve Ebbsfleet. www.thetimes.com/article/9b1f...

To anyone considering family train holiday in Europe, it works. Back from two weeks; LDN>Brussels>Munich >Verona>Turin->London. 6yo fave train, the Nightjet sleeper to Munich. Rest of us, the train over the Alps into Italy. Hat tip to @seatsixtyone.bsky.social for opening eyes to what is doable.1/

No, no, nooooo!! I’m far too young and sprightly I tell you!! I demand to pay full price!! What’s that? A third off first class advance fares you say? Well, if you put it like that, maybe just this once…

HOW MUCH DID IT COST? The question everyone's asking! Short answer, all train travel from my local station to Kușadasi & back in 1st class: £894. Includes 6 nights accommodation. In fact, less: I bought our passes in the Interrail sale at 15% off. Kids used youth passes, €303.

FAMILY HOLIDAY TO KUŞADASI IN TURKEY BY TRAIN? Impossible? Nope! We’ve literally just done it. Now back in Blighty on board a Paris-London Eurostar! 🇹🇷🇬🇧🥂🍾

MUNICH TO LONDON BY TRAIN. Step 1, the daily 06:51 TGV Duplex from Munich Hbf to Paris Est. Step 2, the 15:07 Eurostar from Paris Nord arriving London St Pancras 16:30…

MUNICH: Walked 12 minutes north of Munich Hbf to see a bit of history I never knew existed until this year. The 1938 Munich Agreement was signed in this building, by Neville Chamberlain, Édouard Daladier, Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini & Galeazzo Ciano. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_...

VIENNA TO MUNICH on the 10:28 Railjet, business class. We’re using Interrail passes on the Bucharest to London sector.

BUCHAREST TO VIENNA on the Dacia Express. We’ve lucked out and have an en suite sleeper compartment. Bucharest Gara de Nord 15:07, due into Vienna 08:20 tomorrow morning.

Haven’t set eyes on this - Bucharest’s Palace of Parliament and former Ceaucescu’s palace since 1992 when everyone was a bit cagey about it… Oh and it’s 24C and RAINING. Was expecting 32C sun like last week! Had forgotten what rain was…

Heading home! Now on the 20:00 from Istanbul Halkali to Bucharest, due in 17:11 tomorrow, in a 4-berth couchette.

A scoot round Istanbul including the Grand Bazaar on our last day in Turkey. Then afternoon tea at the Pera Palas…

Another night at the Pera Palace Hotel in Istanbul, a 3rd floor Greta Garbo corner room directly above the one we had here a week ago. Most comfortable bed of the whole trip. And that Garbo letter looks genuine. Swapping the PP tonight for a Turkish couchette car to Bucharest…

ANKARA TO ISTANBUL by high-speed YHT train. Now in the TCDD business lounge in the impressive YHT station, on the other side of the tracks from Ankara’s classic 1937 station.

Good morning! The Izmir to Ankara sleeper is about 1h50 late. But I have a decent coffee from the yemekli vagon next door to our sleeper.

Izmir to Ankara overnight on the Izmir Mavi Tren, leaving Izmir Basmane 19:05, arriving Ankara 08:46. We have air-con 2-berth sleepers in one of two ‘yatakli vagon’.

Kusadasi to Izmir: Waiting for a train at Çamlik, closest station to Kusadasi. Not much here, the village is a mile away.

Sad news from Amsterdam Centraal. I hope Elvis the cockatoo goes to a good home...

EPHESUS, the ancient Greek city dating from 1400 BC. On this, a very special birthday I thought I’d go somewhere that made me feel young. “Just another old ruin” says Master 61 (I’m not entirely sure he was talking about Ephesus...)

Talgo gets its ICE-L trains approved to run in Germany, paving the way for these new level-boarding trains to run Amsterdam-Berlin & Hamburg-Copenhagen. www.lavanguardia.com/dinero/20250...

WE MADE IT! LONDON TO KUŞADASI, no airports, no flights! And now for a few days R&R….

Now on the 12:35 regional train from Izmir Basmane to Selçuk for taxi to Kuşadasi…

I was going to take public transport metro/Izban from Basmane to Alcansak. Staffed offices closed. No staff. After 10 minutes of trying to work out these machines I gave up and took a taxi for £2.59.

ISTANBUL TO IZMIR in a day. Step 1, the 09:90 IDO ferry from Istanbul Yenikapi terminal to Bandirma. I am now somewhere in the Sea of Marmara… www.seat61.com/train-travel...

My favourite inter-continental ferry ride, across the Bosphorus from Europe to Asia for all of £1.30. Haydarasa station is still beautiful, its roof repaired after the fire, but still no trains. One day, perhaps…

This morning we visited the Istanbul cat museum (Mx 61 insisted). 15 lovely cats live there, one temporarily adopted Master 61, and a kitten decided she had a thing for my shoes. Also, they did great coffee.

Forgot to mention: Agatha Christie wrote ‘Murder on the Orient Express’ here at the Pera Palace Hotel in room 411. It’s currently occupied, so below is a photo of Mrs 61 sitting in room 411 in 2005…

We’ve checked into the incomparable Pera Palace Hotel, built in 1892 by the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits for its Orient Express passengers. I stayed here in 1995, 2005, 2013 and absolutely love it.

Dinner tonight at the Lale Restaurant, aka The World Famous Pudding Shop. I discovered it in 1995, it was famous in the 1960s as a stop on the Hippie Trail - when you could drive a beat-up VW from London to India via Iran & Afghanistan without being arrested or blown up.

ISTANBUL EXPRESS! We’ve now boarded the direct Turkish couchette car from Bucharest (dep 10:11) to Istanbul Halkali (arr 09:56 tomorrow). Air-con off, hopper windows…

Just 40 minutes queuing at the International ticket window at Bucharest’s imposing Gara de Nord to collect my ticket for Istanbul, leaving tomorrow morning (I think the chap at the front was trying to buy a 50-person group ticket to Vladivostok)

BRASOV TO BUCHAREST on the 10:43 Astra Trans Carpatic, a private open-access operator competing with CFR (Romanian Railways). This IC2 diesel train was originally built for Danish Railways, suffered unreliability issues, but seems to have found a good home in Romania!

CASTLE BRAN. The link with Vlad the Impaler is tenuous. With Bram Stoker’s ‘Dracula’ a little stronger, he knew of Bran and the description of the castle in the novel matches. But the real connection here is with Marie, grand-daughter of Queen Victoria & Prince Albert.

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 🛳️ 🚉 Rail & Sail ferry to Belfast ‘set up to fail’. Just 12 a day use service between Scotland & Northern Ireland @seatsixtyone.bsky.social “The rot set in when Stena Line moved from Stranraer, where the port adjoined the railway station, to remote Cairnryan,” 🆓 ⏬️ www.thetimes.com/article/8790...

BUDAPEST TO BRASOV on the sleeper train ‘Corona’, leaving Budapest Keleti 17:40, arrives Brasov 09:46 next morning. A classic soviet-era sleeping-car, with dinner in the diner. 🛏️