The Can & Cannot’s of Train Travel – Part II

It was a big NO, for the Nozomi... From the positively ‘cannot’ to the ‘maybe can’, train travel can be a fun, scenic and enjoyable way to get around. But it can also be awful – having talked about the two absolute worst-case scenarios yesterday, here we look at things that aren’t as bad…although still frequently unfortunate.   Savings, what savings? Across the world, I’ve paid a wide variety of prices for train travel. In Ireland... Read More

Back to the Future…

This afternoon (morning in Japan, evening back in Chicago – so, I’ve taken the average which puts me somewhere around 2pm) sees me sitting in a highly desirable business class seat – which I take pleasure in announcing I’ll be converting into a bed for the remainder of the journey – for the 13 hour ‘hop’ from Chicago to Tokyo. How I managed to secure this seat is quite another issue; basically I was running late to start... Read More

Hanging with the Spanish, in Greektown…

As I write this evening, from the aptly-named ‘windy city’ Chicago, I’m surrounded by a bunch of angry Spaniards desperately trying to connect their laptops simultaneously to the hostels wireless network. This time last night I would have been sitting on a train struggling to stay awake amid the strangely fatigue-inducing sway of the train, steaming along from New York to make it to Chicago for about 10-ish this morning – a fairly... Read More