THE ROMANCE OF Train Travel

Travelling by train on a Eurail Global Pass gives you more bang for your buck and allows you to see more of Europe. It is like a time-out where you can take in nature's bounteous beauty

- Rukma Saluja

EUROPE remains an attraction with her cobbled streets and winding lanes,old buildings and genteel air. Through centuries of battles lost and won, migration of artisans and new ideas, techniques and innovations, she had achieved a level of beauty and sophistication in her art and architecture.

Then came the great wars where she became the battleground, and paid the price by losing a large part of that allure, an essential old world charm. To date, there is a sense of before and after the War, in what could be conserved and what had to be built anew. WW2 was harder on some cities than others. As each country got back on its feet, the brave attempt to salvage some of that heritage is visible everywhere. In the process new styles of architecture sit boldly along with the old. Art galleries and museums abound, and are impossible to resist.

With the carbon footprint an automatic side comment about travel, going by train where possible is an increasingly attractive option. The chug of the steam engines is a charming memory best experienced in movies like Murder on the Orient Express and North by Northwest, trains now are fast, modern and well connected.

Eurail connects 31 countries in Europe and the Eurail Pass is valid from three days to up to three months, enabling quicker and more flexible travel without the protocols connected to air travel. Travel apps are the goto platform for travellers now and the Eurail Rail Planner App is a reliable companion. The journeys are short (by Indian standards) and the countryside that one passes is tranquil and scenic. Closer to the cities, most walls are covered with colourful graffiti. Beer and snacks in the dining cars, and sitting by the window, is reminiscent of train journeys of childhood, but this time inefficient trains that keep good time and are as systematically run as journeys by air.