Trains

Riding the trains of Europe during the summer puts you squarely in the middle of a giant mass of people on the move. It really can be great fun, and trains are one of the best places to meet people and to exchange information about traveling. I can recall being in a six-person compartment and sharing it with travelers from four different countries. When a young woman claimed the last seat, we asked her where she was from, and she cheerfully replied, “Zimbabwe.”

Some train basics follow. These will make much more sense if you read Basics #2 first.
- European trains run on “military time,” that is, the 24-hour clock, so get used to 2pm being written as 1400, 10pm as 2200, and so on. Just subtract twelve and add a “pm” to convert. Also, dates are written in the order of day, month, year. June 12, 2001, would be written numerically as 12-6-01. Be careful with this when entering Flexi pass dates. I always write out the month, to avoid confusion.