A piece on my Interrail trip I called Septerrail, Interrail in September
Pic: Somewhere in Europe :)
Everyone likes traveling and every young adult seeks the feeling of freedom, that’s why I felt so fortunate to have had the opportunity of having this awesome experience.
Interrail is all about a backpack and some points and ideas on a map. You start with expectations and curiosity. You don’t know what you’ll find but that’s exactly what you signed up for, and you know it.
Why going solo
I love people and I consider myself an extrovert person, don’t get me wrong. But I feel like it is very important in life to know yourself. Having time and experiences by yourself helps you to be more comfortable.
The planning
My planning process was really simple. I did my last exam of the summer term on the 6th of September- pretty late but it is what it is at TUM :)
After some after-exams celebrations with my friends, I went home to Italy and made my research for destinations and nice places in Europe. A very simple task if you know the beauty of the Old Continent. I prepared my travel companion, a 36 liters Osprey backpack. It weighed 10 kilos and I’m quite proud of it knowing later on my trip people doing the same thing as I did with 70 liters of backpacks, and I didn’t miss anything. I had with me all I needed and I felt like with it I was ready to go anywhere and forever. I also clipped a moon brooch to it, a nice present I received from my sister just before leaving for my adventure.
Pic: My backpack and I on a train somewhere between Austria and Hungary. You can also see the moon brooch on the right.
I made a pretty spontaneous choice. I decided I would make my itinerary as I was on the way. That meant sacrificing more budget (don’t reserve for Paris only a handful of days ahead, it will be expensive!!!) but in return you get the possibility of deciding on the go where you want to go next. I decided I would start in East Europe and make my way through West Europe. My plan was to see as many diverse locations as possible.
The start and my essentials
At 8 am on the 10th of September, I started my journey from my hometown Bolzano. On my only long-distance transportation system for the rest of the trip, the train. I was really hyped.
I had with me my Kindle to read during the hours spent on the train not looking out the window. My book for this trip was “How to build a car” by famous F1 aerodynamicist Adrian Newey (a really good book as I added it to my favorite books). As a passionate F1 fan and aero interested I was trying to understand in which direction I wanted to develop my career going forward and this book is like gold for any mech or aero engineering student. Another thing I couldn’t forget was a journal. I was looking forward to journaling and documenting my trip. Other than that I couldn’t forget my pixel phone with which I took awesome pictures for my trip as you will see later.
The itinerary
Budapest
For my first destination, I decided to visit Budapest, Hungary.
Pic: View of Pest from the Buda-side.
Great city and the perfect beginning. I arrived in the capital of Hungary after some 9 hours of train and one 7-minute train change at the Vienna train station. It was close, but I made it.
I had a great time on my 5-day stay. I ate really good and inexpensive food. I experienced the duality of Buda and Pest: the two very different identities of the city. Budapest is an underrated city with a lot to offer and a lot of young people. As a history nerd, I loved the museums and the complicated different facets of time that the city experienced.
Budapest made me a surprise. For my trip, I organized for my friends on Instagram a little game I called “city guesser”. You maybe already know what I am talking about. I would post on my arrival in every city of my trip an Instagram story, that wouldn’t be too difficult for my friends to understand where I was. It was fun and got a lot of feedback and even very often correct answers. This way a friend of mine saw that I was in the capital of Hungary and by pure coincidence he was also there. Of course, we met and we had some good beers and goulash. For this should social networks be used and for this should they be intended.
During my stay, I made time for my planning and decided I would like to see another city in the East of Europe next.
Prague
Prague was an obvious choice. I already visited this beautiful city once, but only for a short time. This time I wanted to explore it more carefully. Plus I was looking for the best way, after Budapest, to arrive in West Europe and the most effective approach for this was the capital of the Czech Republic which has a good enough connection with North Europe, the location of my third stop.
Pic: The Old Town Square and the old astronomical clock, first installed in 1410.
The trip from Budapest to Prague lasted 8 hours. Prague is a gem.
If you like technology, you have to take a moment and learn about the astronomical clock attached to the Old Town Hall. As I learned from reading Wikipedia, “The clock was first installed in 1410, making it the third-oldest astronomical clock in the world and the oldest clock still in operation”. I learned there that most tourists don’t even try to understand what they are looking at. People didn’t even take the time to learn how to tell the time on the famous clock. To be fair, without spending some time learning about the clock’s complications, it’s quite difficult to understand what’s going on.
I loved the Old Town. Everything is near and you have a really nice sense of feeling comfortable in the streets. I always tried to walk as much as possible and this way it took not too long to learn the city and to be able to easily orient myself.
Prague was the only place on my trip where I didn’t stay in a hostel. This time I decided on a hotel. Hostels are great, as a solo traveler is the easiest way to meet people, but you have to be ready to share the room with other people. Hotels offer more privacy and I liked the opportunity of having some days with some more privacy.
Amsterdam
Next stop: Amsterdam.
Pic: What you see when you think of Amsterdam.
Amsterdam is a nice place. This time the transfer trip was very long. I spent all day on the train and I arrived at 7 pm. Upon arrival, I remember thinking that this place felt different with respect to what I knew.
Even here I had the opportunity (thanks to my city guesser game) of meeting with someone I knew from school. Also this time, like in Budapest, wasn’t planned.
The city is very diverse. A lot of cultural diversity and young people make this place a very interesting place to be in. I loved the museums here. I spent a lot of time in the Van Gogh Museum. The audio guide is one of the best I had on my trip. You learn a lot about Van Gogh’s arts and life. He also lived in Paris and there I found him again. A nice continuity factor between these two cities.
Paris
This time the trip by train was not that long. I was really looking forward to seeing Paris. This was my first time there.
Pic: Eiffel tower by night
Paris is huge and this was the only city in my itinerary I felt like I needed to use the public transportation system, which is well organized. I remember thinking immediately how crowded the city was. Everywhere you go is full of people. I know it’s normal for Paris, but I didn’t love it. Obviously, the city is beautiful and Montmartre was my favorite neighborhood, one of the only places you can enjoy walking through the old silent narrow streets. For me, the most impactful monument is Sainte-Chapelle with those gorgeous windows. The feeling of being there surrounded by so much color was awesome.
Pic: The gorgeous windows of Sainte-Chapelle
In Paris, I met with a friend of mine studying at TUM doing an Erasmus semester in Paris. It was nice being able to meet someone and being shown around in Paris too.
This time the element of continuity between this city and the next was the fact that I ate a lot of croissants and pain au chocolat in both of them :)
Marseille
This city was the only one I knew from the beginning I wanted to visit. But it didn’t go according to plan.
Pic: Marseille from its highest point.
My favorite book ever is The Count of Montecristo (you can find this one here too: matsan.it/books). Marseille is the location for some parts of the story. I was really looking forward to seeing with my eyes what I read already a couple of times in Dumas’ masterwork. In particular, there is a Museum located in a central location of the story I wanted to see: the Château d’If. Unfortunately every day I was there the sea was too rough for the ferries to sail and by ferry is the only way you can reach the island just outside the port of Marseille. It was really frustrating. I could even see the island from the city and I couldn’t reach it. I guess I have to go back sometime. I comforted myself with a nice bath in the late September Mediterranean sea. What’s better than that?
But I was fortunate to meet there a very nice group of people coming from every part of the world and we had great fun especially the last night, as it was the last for many of us. And also for me. And so time was up for me.
The day I had my odyssey back home, I made some time to buy some freshly baked macaroon, to bring home to my sister, as she loves macaroon. After that, I had something like 14 hours on 5 different trains before arriving in Bolzano during the night.
Some numbers
I was in 6 countries.
I traveled by train 4,300 kilometers.
I traveled on 13 different trains.
I was 1 day 20 hours and 52 minutes on trains.
And finally, the numbers I’m most proud of: 436,000 steps or 340 km on foot. That’s 17 km/day.
But numbers aren’t the whole thing so let’s think a little.
Some final thoughts
These are the type of adventures where you have a great time when in the moment, and later looking back you have an even greater positive feeling about the experience.
I’m glad I journaled. Looking over those notes even one month later it’s giving me another perspective on my trip, and I can’t even imagine what will feel like in 5, 10, or 20 years time.
I feel very fortunate because I know that was a positive experience in my life. There is no better feeling than knowing that what you enjoy doing makes you better. Makes me push harder toward my goals and new experience that will occur.
Life is good.
Ciao!