I guess that I am a typical bloke in as much as I love planning, adore writing lists and like to collect things. My ‘things’ are invariably football or travel related, though I do stop short at the need to complete journeys to every country or to visit every football ground in England, even though I have visited a fair few stadiums by default rather than by design and I would like to think I will exceed 100 countries visited.
I started ‘collecting’ overseas train journeys in 1987 with Hoek of Holland to Amsterdam being my first one.
Pretty nondescript by all accounts (apart from the odd windmill to relieve the view of flat fields full of cabbages), but with the timetables in Dutch, announcements in a foreign language and most spectacularly a double-decker train, I felt I had really experienced something special at the time.
Amsterdam Centraal Station
I have now made well over 200 such journeys, 27 of which have been overnight trips. A few notable journeys:
1st Journey – Hoek of Holland to Amsterdam, September 1987
Longest Single Journey – Simferopol to Lviv (Ukraine) – 25 Hours, September 2011
Train For A Day, Ukraine
Northernmost Journey – The Ofoten Line from Narvik (Norway) to Kiruna (Sweden) – 130 miles above the Arctic Circle, September 1989 & September 1992
Most Picturesque Journey – Trondheim to Fauske (Norway), September 1989 & September 1992
1st Journey Outside Europe – Luxor to Cairo (Egypt), April 1995
1st Journey in Asia – The Canton-Kowloon Railway, Guangzhou to Hong Kong, October 1996
1st Journey in South America – Puno to Cusco (Peru), September 2001
Cusco Bound in Peru
1st Sleeper Car Journey – Leipzig (Germany) to Warsaw (Poland), September 1992
Most Easterly Journey – Surabaya to Banyuwangi (Indonesia), September 1997
Favourite Journey – The Toros Express, Ankara to Adana (Turkey), May 2009
The Toros Express Stretches Eastwards in Turkey
1st Train Shower – Santiago de Compostela to Madrid (Spain), June 2012
Slowest Trains – Albania, Average Speed 37KMH
The locomotive that pulled us from Tirana to Durres in Albania
Favourite Element – The Restaurant Car
Breakfast On-board, Torres Express, Ankara to Adana, Turkey
Latest Journey – Stuttgart to Frankfurt (Germany), April 2017
The ICE Train Arriveth, Frankfurt
Next Planned Journey – Lille (France) to London, May 2017
Here is a list of all my overseas journeys, a list that I will keep updated on the dedicated page on this blog:
Bar Station, Montenegro
| Country | Journeys (Overnight) | Number |
| Albania | Tirana to Durres (return) + Tirana to Shkodra | 3 |
| Armenia | Yerevan to Tbilisi | 1 |
| Austria | Vienna to Salzburg + Innsbruck to Vienna + Vienna to Maribor + Spielfeldstraße to Villach + Villach to Venice + Linz to Paris + Salzburg to Munich | 7 |
| Belarus | Minsk to Vilnius | 1 |
| Belgium | Brussels to Bruges (Return) + Bruges to Gent (return) Brussels to Antwerp (return) + Brussels to Amsterdam + Brussels to London (eight times) + Bruges to Ostend + Brussels to Gent (Return) | 18 |
| Bosnia | Sarajevo to Belgrade | 1 |
| Bulgaria | Oslo to Gorna Oryakhovitsa (return) | 2 |
| China | Guangzhou to Kowloon | 1 |
| Croatia | Zagreb to Split + Ploce to Sarajevo | 2 |
| Cuba | Trinidad de Cuba to Valley de los Ingenios (return) | 2 |
| Czechia | Prague to Linz + Prague to Bohusovice nad Ohri (return) | 3 |
| Denmark | Copenhagen to Stockholm + Copenhagen to Oslo | 2 |
| Egypt | Luxor to Cairo | 1 |
| Finland | Kimi to Torvola (Return) + Kimi to Helsinki + Helsinki to Turku | 4 |
| France | Avignon to Lyon + Lyon top Strasbourg + Le Havre to Rouen (return) + Epernay to Paris + Nice to Monaco (Return) + Paris to Quimper (Return) + Paris to Luxembourg (twice) + Nimes to Paris + Paris to Brussels + Cherbourg to Paris + Paris to Copenhagen + Paris to Calais + Lille to London + Paris to London (sixteen times) | 33 |
| Georgia | Makhinjauri to Yerevan | 1 |
| Germany | Munich to Salzburg + Munich to Holzkirchen (Return) + Munich to Innsbruck + Trier to Dortmund + Dortmund to Cologne + Cologne to Hamburg + Hamburg to Amsterdam + Berlin to Leipzig + Leipzig to Warsaw + Dusseldorf to Monchengladbach (return) + Dusseldorf to Cologne + Stuttgart to Frankfurt + Frankfurt to Oberusel | 15 |
| Greece | Athens to Thessaloniki + Thessaloniki to Kalambaka (return) + Thessaloniki to Skopje | 4 |
| Hungary | Budapest to Prague + Budapest to Bucharest | 2 |
| India | Agra to Delhi | 1 |
| Indonesia | Jakarta to Bogor + Yogyakarta to Surabaya + Surabaya to Banyuwangi | 3 |
| Ireland | Dublin to Cork | 1 |
| Italy | Genoa to Turin + Turin to Milan + Catania to Naples + Sorrento to Pompei (return) + Sorrento to Naples + Pisa to Florence (return) + Venice to Rimini + Rimini to Ferrara + Ferrara to Milan + Milan to Interlaken + Milan to Genoa (Return) + Milan to Monza + Palermo to Agrigento + Agrigento to Syracuse + Syracuse to Taormina + Taormina to Catania + Bolonga to Venice + Venice to Verona + Verona to Milan + Milan to Como + Como to Tirano + Tirano to Chur (Bernina Express) | 25 |
| Luxembourg | Luxembourg to Brussels + Luxembourg to Ettelbruck (return) + Luxembourg to Trier | 4 |
| Macedonia | Skopje to Nis | 1 |
| Moldova | Chisinau to Odessa | 1 |
| Montenegro | Bar to Podgerica | 1 |
| Morocco | Fes to Marrakech | 1 |
| Netherlands | Hoek of Holland to Amsterdam (twice) + Amsterdam to Munich + Amsterdam to Alkmaar + Amsterdam to Hoek of Holland (twice) + Amsterdam to Copenhagen + Amsterdam to Den Haag (return) + Amsterdam to Dusseldorf | 10 |
| Norway | Oslo to Trondheim (twice) + Trondheim to Fauske (twice) + Narvik to Lulea (twice) + Oslo to Bergen + Bergen to Myrdal + Myrdal to Flam (return) + Myrdal to Oslo + Oslo to Gjøvik (return) + Trondheim to Hell (return twice) + Oslo to Moss (return) | 19 |
| Peru | Puno to Cusco + Agua Caliente to Cusco | 2 |
| Poland | Warsaw to Krakow + Krakow to Budapest + Warsaw to Lodz (return) | 4 |
| Romania | Bucharest to Chisinau | 1 |
| Russia | Kaliningrad to Svetlogorsk (return) + Kaliningrad to Minsk | 3 |
| Serbia | Nis to Sofia + Belgrade to Sofia | 2 |
| Slovenia | Maribor to Spielfeldstraße + Ljubljana to Skofja Loka (return) | 3 |
| Spain | Santiago de Compostela to Madrid + Madrid to Barcelona + Madrid to Cordoba + Cordoba to Cadiz + Cadiz to Seville + Madrid to Segovia (return) + Denia to Alicante + Palma to Soller (return) + Barcelona to Sitges (return) + Barcelona to Montserrat (return) + Madrid to Toledo (return) | 16 |
| Sweden | Stockholm to Oslo + Lulea to Nice + Lulea to Kimi + Stockholm to Berlin via Malmö | 4 |
| Switzerland | Geneva to Interlaken + Interlaken to Bern + Bern to Geneva + Geneva to Lausanne (return) Interlaken to Montreaux + Montreaux to Lausanne + Lausanne to Paris + Chur to St Moritz + St Moritz to Zermatt + Zermatt to Zurich | 11 |
| Syria | Hama to Homs + Aleppo to Latakia | 2 |
| Thailand | Bangkok to Vientiane | 1 |
| Turkey | Istanbul to Thessaloniki + Istanbul to Ankara + Ankara to Adana + Pendik to Ankara + Ankara to Erzurum | 5 |
| Ukraine | Sevastopol to Bakhchysarai (return) + Sevastopol to Simferopol + Simferopol to Lviv + Lviv to Kiev | 5 |
| Vietnam | Hue to Hanoi | 1 |
| Total Journeys | 230 (27) |
I like lists too, but I would be unable to list all my train journeys 😉
May I suggest a new category: most delayed train journey. My personal one is Tatvan to Kayseri in Turkey, in January 1993, delayed by 26 hours because of 2 meters of snow on the tracks.
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That’s a great one! I hope you didn’t have to wait at the station all that time! How many train journeys do you think you have made overseas?
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