Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/07/11/the-best-train-travel-guide-is-run-by-one-man-all-for-free.html
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Contributed by Natalie Dressed.
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Yes, I can highly recommend seat61.com, thanks Natalie! The author is called Mark Smith and used to work in the British rail industry before seat61.com became his full time job in 2007.
The site is called after his preferred seat number in the Eurostar first class cars. Most no-fly trips from the UK to the rest of the world involve a leg by Eurostar, crossing the Channel in the Channel Tunnel. (Alternatives are ferries, like the Harwich - Hoek van Holland or the Newcastle - Ijmuiden ferries.)
Best thing regarding this invaluable resource: it is all still hand-crafted html, no CMS involved.
If you like your climate to sustain human civilization, you should strive to avoid flying. Next to eating less meat, it is the single most impactful behavioural change. In our current situation, flying for leisure or business is something a responsible person should avoid at all cost.
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Used his site back in 2016 for a 3 week journey though Europe, worked so wonderfully for planning the journeys from France to Germany to Italy.
The consolidated info was fantastic to smoothing the trip out across the many countries.
Though the 3 hours stuck in a train station in Italy due to a brush fire near the tracks was an unavoidable hiccup that is seared into my tales…
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It’s baffling to me that one (very dedicated) person can create a far more useful resource than all the European rail companies put together. I’ve used this site to find the best routes from the Netherlands to Oslo and Barcelona, and in both cases the information on Seat61 was far more complete than anything offered by the various businesses involved. The only thing better at this time would probably be to hire a travel agent to arrange everything for you, and I suspect they’d also be using Seat61.
(international rail in Europe is very hit and miss in my limited experience, though I will say the old saying of “it’ll either be a good time or a good story” is certainly true.)
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I remember back when I was a kid, there was a guy in the ticket office of a station in (I think?) Wales who knew the UK rail network like the back of his hand. If you wanted to get between two points in the UK, you could give him a ring, and he’d tell you the best routes to travel on, and the cheapest combination of fares.
Theoretically you could ring your local ticket office for the same information, but they could rarely help with anything complicated. This was back before the internet was widespread, so access to information like train timetables was lmited.
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According to the research, avoiding flying has a bigger impact, but neither of those are close to the top of the list.
Thanks for the link. Good story. It says the top four ways to lower your carbon footprint are: be child-free, car-free, meat-free, & avoid long plane flights.
No it doesn’t. Here’s the graphic from the paper:
Diet is seventh in the list of impacts. And check out that log scale.
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