To infinity and beyond! (by train)

Well ok, just to Sweden.

I am very fortunate to have a friend in Sweden who has a wonderful summerhouse on a car free island, with a composting toilet, wood heated sauna and a diving board into the sea which has an average temperature of 24oC in the summer.

Tranholmen (Island of the Cranes) has not been graced by me for the past four years as I have been unwilling to fly. However, this year I was determined to go by hook or by crook, but not by plane.

I'd like to tell you it was easy to sort out. It was not. (more later)

I'd like to tell you it was cheaper than by plane. It was not.

I'd like to tell you it was quicker than by plane. It was not. (although it was close, all things considered.)

What I can tell you is that travelling through five countries, speaking four languages in 24 hours and seeing all this from some of Europe's finest and most comfortable train carriages was fantastic. I also met some great people on the train, four of whom will come and visit me later in the year. And I learnt that Faroese has 32 different letters in its alphabet and that doesn't include C, Q, W, X or Z.

Its certainly not easy, but you'll need about two hours free time and the internet.

Go to the man in seat 61. They'll give you tips on how to get to where you are going and links to other websites.

It turned out that I would need five separate tickets. To save the bother of doing that, I bought an interail ticket which meant I could just breeze through and pay a small supplement on a few of the trains.

You'll also probably need to go on Eurostar, which is so fast it almost scary - London to Brussels in under two hours!

If you really want to be prepared for any alterations to your schedule, purchase the Thomas Cook rail map and Europe Rail timetable which details every train going to everywhere.

I was most impressed that a month in advance of my journey, the Germans could tell me which platform I would be on at 22.35 on a Tuesday evening.

We spent the whole holiday in the sea swimming and in the sauna, er saunaing.