Should You Take the Night Train? The Answer is No.

Travel in Europe is wonderful for many reasons, but one I love is that countries are (relatively) small, and you can experience many different cities, cultures, and histories on a single jaunt. This becomes especially important when you factor in the price of airfare from the Utah to Europe.  Once you are in Europe, it makes sense to include multiple cities and countries in your itinerary.  Logistics become an issue, and you need to make decisions that factor in prices, physiological needs like sleep, and, perhaps your most valuable commodity: TIME.

Europe has a first-rate network of trains that crisscross the continent, and provide an economical way to get from point A to point B.  Plus, there is a sense of romance in traveling on a night train.  It replaces the need for a hotel, and you can bed down in the train, and wake up in a new city, ready to hit the tourist spots.  It all sounds awesome - - until you actually experience a night on a train. 

Takin a night train is one of the worst things you can do in Europe, and here are the reasons why:

1.     It kills your time.  Yes, it is supposed to be a time saver because you sleep while you are traveling, but my experience is that night trains are less than ideal because you have to check in to the train station, and many “night trains” depart in the late afternoon, which means you lose valuable sightseeing time in your departure city. 

2.     The luggage problem.  When you take a night train, you will check out of your hotel in the morning, and then have some things on your itinerary, and then you will go to the train station.  What are you going to do with your luggage?  Drag it around the city all day long.  Trust me, you will hate every single thing you decided you needed to bring after dragging it through cobblestone streets for an afternoon.  One more reason to pack light, which is a topic for another day.

3.     It doesn’t save you money.  It’s true that you might save money with a night train, but not as much as you might think.  Depending on your level of service, night trains can be dirt cheap, or pretty expensive.  And you get what you pay for.  The cheapest tickets on a night train get you a seat—not a bed.  The more expensive ones get you a bed, but also several roommates.  The most expensive ones get you a real bed, but are often on par with hotels in terms of expense.

Night Train from Paris to Milan

4.     Night Trains turn you into a zombie.  Lastly, and for me the most important, thing to consider: How groggy to you want to be when you hit the ground running in a new city?  I have never had a decent night’s sleep on a night train.  And I’m a pretty deep sleeper!  I wake up feeling sandy-eyed and I experience the day in a stupor, and that is a bad recipe for enjoying a new European city. Honestly, this is the reason that I react with ennui when people mention Prague.  I was only there for a day and a half, and I was too tired to care about the St. Charles Bridge, or any of the things the Czech Republic had to offer.  Talk about a surefire way to put a damper on your vacation.

Sitting in front of this statue of Jan Hus in Prague was pretty much the only thing I wanted to do on this day.

If there is an option to take a cheap flight, I will choose it every time. There are tips and tricks to maximizing the benefits of these cheap airfares within Europe, which I will address in a future post, but I personally would rather deal with them than be too tired to enjoy my vacation.  And if a flight option just doesn’t work, then my expert advice is to make sure you have some OTC sleeping pills to help minimize the pain of an overnight train.

What do you think?  Let me know in the comments section below.  If you have other travel questions, include them as well, and I might feature your question in a future post.

Ciao!