In England, Shrove Tuesday no longer carries the religious significance it once did. Gone is the symbolic pantry-clearing tradition of a Christian household, and in its place an excuse for gluttony. But let us not dwell on England’s failures, but instead look across the waters to our old enemy to see what has become of their traditional dish. In central Paris few corners are without crêperies, and few streets without the sweet smell of butter sizzling so what better place to begin the search for the most tempting pancake.

Breizh Cafe

In an area fraught with tourist traps the Breizh Cafe on Paris’ Rue Vielle du Temple is a refreshing break from the norm. With a proudly simple menu and exceptional ingredients, founder Bertrand Larcher has made it his life’s work to create an atmosphere that creates a “new kind of crepe experience”. With restaurants in his home town of Cancale, two in Paris and one in Tokyo, the concept seems to be proving itself. Come here for the classics: a galette with ham and cheese cooked in front of your eyes on a billig, and if you’re feeling brave sample a lait ribot – a drink of lightly sparkling fermented milk.

90 Rue Vieille du Temple | Open Weds-Sat: 12pm-11pm, Sun: 12pm-10pm, Closed Monday and Tuesday

L’Avant Comptoir

If you’re more comfortable eating your crêpes on the roadside, but want a reliable standard, opt for l’Avant-Comptoir on Carrefour de l’Odéon. With a crêperie in the front, and wine bar at the back, it’s a case of standing room only at this popular bistro. Open every day, and by far the most reasonably priced of our Parisian trio, the pancakes at this establishment will do exactly what you’d expect.

3 Carrefour de l’Odéon | Open every day

Compagnie de Bretagne

The Compagnie de Bretagne, just south of the Île de la Cité, boasts traditional Bréton ingredients and artisan ciders, bringing a little luxury to the genre. With fillings ranging from rhubard compote, and caramelised salt butter to galettes bursting with lobster, this crêperie is nothing if not creative. In chic monochromatic decor, you can enjoy an interesting take on the traditional.

9, rue de l’Ecole de Médecine | Open every day, noon-midnight

To find out more on train travel in France, check out the Loco2 Engine Room forum.

To book trains, use our European Train Planner. Happy railing!

Follow @Loco2

Images: Main image ‘Crepe’, by Dyamsaki reproduced with thanks under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA Licence

The experience of sailing can vary greatly, from a small jaunt to an over-sized pond, to an epic adventure across oceans and through storms. It probably makes sense to do one before the other, but it is possible to get passage on a vessel with more experienced crew members without ever having set sail.

The basics

To find out whether or not sailing is for you (be warned – some seasickness is inevitable at first!) you can learn the ropes with one of the many short courses offered by organisations such as the British Offshore Sailing School (BOSS) in Southampton. To get a qualification that is widely recognised amongst crew seekers, you could also consider a RYA Competent Crew sailing course. It’s suitable for complete beginners and costs about £300. After a 5 days course you’ll have 100 nautical miles under your belt, and four nights at sea, not to mention all manner of skills that will make more attractive to prospective captains. Lessons in skullduggery, piracy, and walking the plank are not included in the price.

Finding a boat

It can be rather expensive to buy your own yacht, with some people having likened it to standing in a shower while tearing up money. But this doesn’t mean you can’t travel around the world on one, and as an international hitchhiker you can be happy in the knowledge that at least it’s not your money down the drain.

There is some paid work available as crew for yacht deliveries, and some larger yachts seek cleaners, cooks and stewards for their vessels. Alternatively seek out private yacht owners who might be willing to take extra crew along for the ride. Expect to contribute to food and fuel costs, and be prepared to take on a fair share of the work; from cooking, cleaning and scrubbing the deck, to 2 hour watch shifts in the middle of the night. The challenge with this is planning your travels in such an unpredictable environment. Also, it is of course crucial that you get on a safe vessel with nice people!

Boats have the equivalent of MOT tests to guarantee their seaworthiness. If you choose to try and find passage on a yacht without getting a qualification like Competent Crew, then larger vessels are probably your best bet – as well as being a more stable ride, there are more decks for you to scrub in order to earn your keep! Be sure to ask about lifeboats and life jackets, drinking water storage, desalination equipment, and radio and navigation technology to name but a few. This isn’t something that should be taken lightly, so do weigh your options carefully before you hop aboard a tin can destined for distance shores.

Useful boat travel sites

Travelling on a yacht that is not your own is never going to be as reliable or predictable as a mode of transport that you can actually book a ticket for, but there is an increasing amount of information available for people seeking passage on a ship. The following sites let you register as a potential crew member and browse yachts who are seeking crew:

• Crew seekers - does what is says on the tin. You can register as an amateur or experienced crew here and find an exciting adventure. You are able to view potential positions on this site but must pay a joining fee in order to reply to ads. While this is a pain it does mean that most people using this site are serious about finding crew.
• Yacht Movers – for those who are already qualified sailors and are seeking more responsibility, these folks are specialists in delivering yachts around the world.
• Work On A Boat – a company that offers training as well as crew placement, and forums.
• Global crew network – offers positions for amateur and experienced crew, though as a fairly new website it’s yet to see how many yacht owners post vacancies on this sites.

What’s it really like?

Using one of the above websites, before I co-founded Loco2, I was able to find passage on a yacht from Mexico to Australia, spending in excess than 4 months living at sea. Though totally inexperienced in the world of yachting I secured my passage by offering my skills as cook and smiling a lot.

Depending on the nature of your adventure, and whether you are combining sailing with other modes of transport (maybe having got the train to Spain you now fancy being spontaneous), a good way to find passage is to actually ask around at marinas themselves. Posting a notice saying ‘crew available’ might give better results than trying to secure something via a website before you get to the sea. If you’re flexible and willing then there are all sorts of opportunities available so get out there and have a go. The golden rule of course is safety first. Never do anything you don’t feel comfortable with, especially if you are travelling on your own.

Images by Jon Olav reproduced with thanks under a CC Attribution license 2.0

Single? Or just hate Valentine’s Day? If you’d rather escape all the mushy nonsense, then spend the weekend in Switzerland instead. Head over to St Moritz on February 11 for some International Bob Run Skating. Teams of three participants will don their ice hockey gear and zoom down the St Moritz’s Olympia Bob Run on ice skates as fast as they can. Although you can’t join in unless you have a licence from an ice hockey club to prove your skating skills, it’s a fascinating spectacle to behold and well worth a visit. Check out the run for yourself…

 Search for trains to St Moritz

The flower battle and parade of lights at the Nice-est carnival around

On February 18-19, take a weekend away for the Nice Carnival. It’s the highlight of the Côte d’Azur in winter, and is one of the biggest and most popular carnivals in the world. The stunning parades are highlighted by the enormous space and beautiful architecture of the Place Massena square. The theme for this year’s parade is the story of ‘The King of Sport’ to honour the 2012 Olympic Games. Thousands of musicians and dancers, aboard tanks up to 20m high will participate in the display.

At the Promenade des Anglais let the ‘Battle of the Flowers’ commence! Elegant floats of exquisite flower arrangements glide through the parade. Ornately costumed people launch thousands of flowers into the air and crowds. In the evening, make your way to the Albert I Gardens for the ‘Parade of Lights’. Nice hosts a spectacular show of visual animations projected on enormous screens in the square. All the floats are also illuminated and the parade continues with a truly magical display.

Search for trains to Nice

Giant fish women and men in suspenders at Dunkerque

Fancy being someone else for the weekend? Head over to France for their annual Mardi Gras Dunkerque Carnival from February 21-23 and don your disguise. The carnival is hundreds of years old and began as a tradition amongst fisherman, gradually evolving into the mayhem of the modern day. The key component of this celebration is the “troupe”, the weekend parades, which you can either join or just enjoy from the sidelines. Put on your “clet’che” (costume) and follow the music. Anything goes here so expect to see thousands of people in all manner of outfits, from women dressed as giant fish to men in suspenders.

Watch your head! It’s a carnival tradition for the mayor to throw smoked herrings from the top of the city hall. The air is filled with the scent of rollmops and potjevleesch (potted meat) from street food stalls, and the sound of traditional French music. See for yourself in this video…

From St. Pancras, Dunkirk is a mere 2hrs away with a change to high-speed TGV at Lille.

Emily Rycroft is Editorial Assistant at Global Cool and is collaborating with Loco2 on a series of Traincation themed posts for Loco2. So be sure to come back next month, and in the meantime, follow the conversation on Twitter:

Follow @traincationFollow @Loco2

Search for trains to Dunkirk

Images by Dunkerque Tourist Board and NiceCarnival.com reproduced with thanks under a CC Attribution license 2.0

When newly elected mayor Boris Johnson announced an impending ban on alcohol on London’s public transport, thousands of people headed underground to take advantage of the last night of legal drinking on the tube. This became the last of the famous Circle Line parties, as service was suspended due to inebriated revellers consistently failing to mind the gap.

Dress up in fancy dress

In an attempt to highlight the plight of rush hour commuters for the Campaign for Better Transport, a mysterious Sardine Man boarded services up and down the UK dressed in a fish suit and business attire. Ironically the train on which he debuted was quite spacious, leaving him to question whether his “one-fish odyssey across Britain’s most crowded rail routes was over before it had begun?”. These days the fishy fellow has turned his attention to the popular Fair Fares Now campaign, championing passenger rights in the UK.

Make a song and dance about it

Sometimes a train ride can be a source of inspiration. That’s what happened to Dan Browne and Scott Semanski, who after riding the rails in Beijing, were inspired to take on rap star aliases (Dano Dizzle and Delish-S) and pen a song. I’m sure we all agree that auto-tune voice effects are the height of sophistication, so crank up the volume and put on your dancing shoes:

Surf it up

We’re definitely not advocating train surfing, but we couldn’t help but read open-mouthed of Dutch daredevil Duncan Zuur  who, not content with traditional waterskiing, took the extreme sport to new levels by tying himself to a moving train. His stunt team conceded that, “it’s not as easy to stop a train if anything goes wrong” but were apparently unperturbed. Thankfully he made it out unscathed proclaiming, “I’d do it again.”

Get down on one knee

It doesn’t sound  like the most romantic proposal, but when Adam King asked for his girlfriend’s hand in marriage on a packed train from Watford Junction with the help of a flash mob choir, the video was an instant YouTube hit. So pluck up the courage to propose to your loved one… and yes ladies we’re looking at you too! It’s a leap year after all, which traditionally means that the last day of February is your chance to pop the question… the rest of the year off course it’s off limits…

Images by thelondonpaper, GSP.ro, and annie mole reproduced with thanks under a CC Attribution license 2.0

You may remember the furore last year when Google debuted flight search technology in the US. And only last week Google expanded the functionality of Google Transit by adding the ability for users of their UK maps to search for train routes in addition to journeys made by car and on foot.

With their latest offering, in partnership with theTrainline, customers can search for UK trains and book them via theTrainline’s external site. Google have added more than 2500 stations and 170,000 routes, in addition to the 250 tube stations and 8000 bus stops already available. Google claims that it will make journey planning for the Olympics much easier, which may be true, but in this guest article for Wired, Loco2 Managing Director, Jamie Andrews questions whether their latest move runs contrary to the neutral position usually expected of Google.

Last year, Google collaborated with TFL to offer detailed tube tram and bus information, so it came as a surprise that Google should co-operate with an independent company rather than National Rail Enquiries, which points people to individual rail operators. Google UK’s geospatial technologist , Ed Parsons, explains,“Google Maps seeks to provide a wide range of local information, and public transport station and schedule information is definitely a part of that. This means we can reach and help a larger number of people with useful national rail train information.” We know better than most that navigating the rails in the UK, as with Europe, is hard enough already so we’re welcoming the innovation but what does this mean for the future of Google’s empire?

What do you think? Does Google’s decision compromise their generally non-aligned stance? Or does it just make something that people are doing anyway (searching various rail sites, potentially translating it into their native language) easier? What’s next for Google Maps?** Let us know in the comments below!

*Comscore Inc.

** Jet Ski? No, that’s already been done (see step 43). Or perhaps integrating real-time rail complaints?

Images by beefman reproduced with thanks under a CC Attribution license 2.0

The Hanging gardens of Marqueyssac

The gardens of Marqueyssac look like something straight out a story book (especially if that story book happens to be Alice in Wonderland). With some of the most beautifully manicured landscapes we have ever encountered, Marqueyssac Gardens in France’s Dordogne region will leave you open-jawed at the attention to detail. The gardens are some 300 years old, that have recently undergone extensive restoration, now boast more than 5km of walking trails through lush scenes of green.

Nearest station: Sarlat-la-Canéda | Search for trains to Sarlat-la-Canéda

Keukenhof Gardens

Keukenhof Gardens in Lisse in southern Holland are as vast as they are beautiful. With a cool 7,000,000 (yep that’s 7 million) flower bulbs planted over 32 acres, including tulips, the iconic bloom of the Netherlands. The name translates as kitchen garden, pointing to the historical use for growing culinary herbs, but now it attracts three quarters of a million visitors between March and May when it’s open to the public in all its floral glory. In 2012 it’s open from 22nd March until 20th May, and since the journey starts at just 4 and half hours by train from London you could almost go for a day trip! For spectacular giant sized floral creations, put 21st April 2012 in your diary, the day of the Flower Parade.

Nearest station: Leiden | Search for trains to Leiden (from here, bus no. 54  takes you directly to Keukenhof in about 25mins)

Isola Bella

In case you need another reason to visit Italy‘s magnificent Lake Maggiore, Isola Bella is it. This rocky island was transformed in 1670 by Count Borromeo, and is the location for his grand villa and equally gorgeous gardens. According to local folklore, ladies from the Count’s household requested that he develop it so he could transfer prisoners from the dungeons of his mainland castle and save them from the sound of their screams (nice!). Nowadays, the terraced gardens, inspired by the hanging gardens of Babylon and with a backdrop of snow-capped mountains are a sight to behold, both on the approach by boat, and up close.

Nearest station: Stresa | Search for trains to Stresa (from here you can head to Carciano dock and get a water taxi to the island)

Tarot Garden, Italy

The Giardino dei Tarrochi in Bomarzo, Italy, is a sculpture garden with larger than life mosaic figures that take tarot cards as their inspiration. Influenced by Gaudí´s Parc Güell in Barcelona, it is a labour of love created by Niki de Siant Phalle which finally opened to the public in 1998 after 20 years work. During it’s construction, Nikki lived in The Empress, a Sphinx shaped mirror-mosaic cavern which became her home and studio for the next seven years.

Nearest station: Capalbio | Search for trains to Capalbio

Garden of Cosmic Speculation

Now for cheeky garden that graces our own shores. It’s only a few hours away in Scotland and only open for one day a year (exclusive!), but the Garden of Cosmic Speculation more than lives up to its name making it worthy of mention on any magical gardens rundown. With evocative names like “Spirals of Time”, “Black Holes” and “Fractals”, features are based on scientific phenomena and mathematica formulae – so though scant on plants the garden is rather an elegant marriage of nature with science.

Nearest station: Dumfries| Search for trains on National Rail

Images by Billward.eu, masudhaq.com and Taylor Gabriela and respective official websites reproduced with thanks under a CC Attribution license 2.0

Here at Loco2 we use a lot of open source software – we use PostgreSQL to store our data, Ruby and Rails for our application (we didn’t just choose rails because we’re selling train tickets), not to mention plenty of open source libraries and plugins as well.

So we’re definitely keen to keep a look-out for reusable parts of our code base that we can contribute back to the community.

One of the things we need to do is interact with SOAP APIs. We were previously using Savon for this. Savon has lots of great features and is quite mature, but unfortunately we didn’t find it particularly easy to extend when we needed to fine-tune the feature set.

Recently we had a need to convert from doing synchronous HTTP requests to doing them asynchronously in an event loop. Savon doesn’t support this, and after looking around at the existing options, we decided to write our own library instead.

The aim of our library was to provide a bit of common functionality to make dealing with SOAP services easier, but to do so in a way that would be really easy for anyone to extend if they wished to. This is important because SOAP and its related technologies are very big and complex, so it’s probably impossible for the library to remain conceptually simple while being “all things to all people”.

To signify our undying love for SOAP, we decided to name it “LolSoap”. You can check out the code on Github, install the gem, and read the documentation.

These days while winters are milder in Britain, much of Europe is still firmly within Jack Frost‘s grip. London has its fair share of pop-up ice rinks, but for those who feel hemmed in there is nothing like taking to the ice surrounded by acres of gloriously frozen lake… and we’re not short of them in Europe!

Switzerland

Skating on London’s inner city ice rinks is an exciting experience of its own but not great if you really long to roam free. Switzerland‘s lakes offer a vast natural expanse for honing your blade running skills.

Lake Sihlsee near Einsiedeln has areas marked out where it is safe to skate – you can rent skates or bring your own and go for free. Lac de Joux in the Jura mountains is paradise for skaters, with its vast perimeter transformed into a giant-sized ice rink with the onset of winter. Or, if you prefer to be within reach of a nice cup of cocoa to warm icy fingers, the refined glamour of St Moritz allows skating on Lake Moritz- and if it’s not open there is even the Eiserena Ludains as back-up!

Lake Sihlsee | Trains to Einsieden 
Eiserena Ludains | Trains to St. Moritz
Lac de Joux | Trains to Le Chenit

Austria

Austria’s so-called “White Lake” (Weissensee), in Carinthia, becomes an ode to winter sports as soon as the cold snap begins. Divided neatly into rinks for curling, skating and even ice golf, hemmed in on all sides by lush woodland and Christmas-card chalets is as stunningly beautiful in winter as it is when the snow departs in summer. Neusiedl Lake is perfect for culture vultures bordering both a national park and some of Austria’s finest wine growing regions. Extreme thrill-seekers should head for the (snow-covered) hills to Zell-am-See resort for skating and winter sports including tobogganing, swimming, and sleigh rides!

Weissensee | Trains to Villach

Sweden

With countless natural lakes, Sweden is an icy maze of rinks waiting to conquered. Nyköping is perfectly placed at the water’s edge so you can spend a day gliding (or sledding if that’s more your thing) in a vast natural ice skating venue before warming up in true Swedish fashion with a sauna. If you consider yourself something of a pro, the Vikingarännet - an 80km race – allows you to sightsee and retrace the footsteps of Vikings all at the same time. Just don’t forget your helmet and cape.

Nyköping | Trains to Nyköping

Holland

Like London, locals in Holland don’t always get the chance to ice skate au natural, due to rising temperatures. When canals iced over in Kinderdijk in the Netherlands, around 2.5million people seized the freeze (if you pardon the pun) to explore nature in its frosty glory. It’s no longer an annual event, but when the cold hits Holland’s famed waterways become natural skating tracks. So if you get the feeling it’s going to be a long hard winter, head to Holland. Kinderdijk is a UNESCO World Heritage Site full off iconic windmills – we can’t think of a more fun (and sustainable) way to travel!

Kinderdijk | Trains to Rotterdam

Images by suvodeb, jchip8, preeto_f06 & china daily reproduced with thanks under a CC Attribution license 2.0

Before we jump into the debate, let us make it clear that Loco2 is focused on tackling the challenges associated with booking European rail. Ask us about software, distribution systems and the complexities of open rail data and we’ll talk for hours. We have enough on our plates without doing battle with the countryside alliance on our tea break. That said, we are also budding train geeks, and we care a lot about the carbon impact of Government decisions. So with that in mind, let us begin to chuck our oar in…

Putting HS2 in context

In general terms of course we’re pro high speed rail, not least because Loco2 is banking on the continued expansion and refinement of Europe’s rail network over the next decade so that people have viable alternatives to short-haul flights. Electrified train networks are much better than diesel-powered ones, because of the significant carbon savings that can result when the electricity used to power them comes from renewable sources. But whilst a better pan-European network gets a big thumbs-up from us, when it comes to infrastructure improvements here in the UK, it’s not quite so simple.

Warren Pearce, a climate change expert on Twitter explained that most CO2 is generated by local car usage, not long distance journeys, and that local rail investment is sorely needed (we agree, but think that this should be in addition to long-distance rail). Warren also pointed us towards this neat summary from back in August, which explains how the Government doesn’t seem to have costed the plans for HS2 particularly well, whilst Simon Jenkins in the Guardian yesterday unleashed a scathing critique of the plans, attacking it from every side, but particularly on the “ill-thought through waste of money” front…

Whilst we agree largely with the criticism that has been levied at the decision, we think it’s important to look at the substance of the plans, and suggest viable alternatives, rather than simply shouting down the notion of any high-speed electrified rail project. The UK does need to invest in its railways, and that should be the starting point of any debate.

In 2009 there was some major investment to electrify two major lines: £1bn to update the London-Swansea line and the Liverpool-Manchester line. This was a wise investment and the Government then had a better perspective on the demand for and benefits of these improvements than it seems to with the current HS2 plans. Despite this, the UK still has proportionally less electric rail than most of our counterparts in Europe; a miserable 40% compared to 56% in Germany (steadily increasing), 73% in the Netherlands and 100% in Switzerland. The majority of our trains are still chugging along at 8 miles to the gallon! So that’s efficiency out the window, and this should most definitely be improved.

High speed North

For the HS2 project itself, one interesting alternative approach has been suggested – “High Speed North” – but it doesn’t seem to have got any major coverage. The idea is rather than focusing on linking London and Birmingham (as the above articles suggest, the notion that thousands of people will immediately start travelling to Birmingham in the 2030s is a bit hard to swallow), instead the focus of a high-speed project should be on linking major cities in the North of the UK, and thereby enable better connections to London, and beyond into Europe, as the image below suggests. The project could also potentially save a lot of carbon too (though to verify claims on that it’s necessary to go to a level of detail not possible in a blog post).

Possible configuration of UK high-speed network. Image from 2M Group website.

One group championing the High Speed North proposals is the 2M Group, an organisation set up to oppose expansion of Heathrow. In this PDF from their website, they explain how the High Speed North proposal could not only benefit travellers in the North seeking to connect to Europe by train, but also ensure that Heathrow’s focus remains on long-haul flights (which are obviously much harder to complete overland) rather than becoming a European short-haul hub (which would vastly increase carbon from aviation emissions).

As mentioned at the beginning of this post, we’re not qualified to judge any proposal comprehensively. But it certainly does seem that with the current plans, the Government is opting for a political win as high-speed rail remains en vogue, without completing the necessary work to come up with the plans that are right for the entire UK economy and environment. It looks to us as though the government has fallen foul of its ego.

Cotton Sky

One of the longest rivers in Europe, The Rhine flows from the Grisons in the Swiss Alps to the North Sea coast of the Netherlands. This photo is taken on the natural border between France and Germany and captures the brilliant blue sky and crystal lake perfectly. Philippe Sainte-Laudy hails from Strasbourg and has photography in his blood, with generations of his family having been in the business.

Find trains to Strasbourg

Rivers of Ice

The Aletsch glacier, in the bernese Oberland in south-western Switzerland, has retreated 3.4 km since peaking at a length of 23 km in 1860. About 1.4 km of the shrinkage has happened over the past 56 years, and it’s predicted it will disappear altogether by 2050 if trends go unchanged. The ice that was once seen as a threat, is now causing more damage as it melts and threatens to flood the valley.

From Fiesch, there are cable cars that take you to the start and end of various hiking and bike trails. From here, unforgettable views of the glacier and the soaring Bernese alps await and you can see for yourself why UNESCO has made this a world heritage site. See more of the Phillippe Saint-Laudy’s work here.

Find trains to Fiesch

Turquoise Dream

Having grown up in Merano, northern Italy, in the shadows of mountains, photographer Matteo Zanvettor cannot help but be entranced by their mystic beauty. Turquoise dreams was taken on the edge of Sorapis lake, near Cortina. The mountain in the background is known as “dito di Dio” or God’s finger. Something of a hidden jewel in the Dolomites, Sorapis is reached by a moderate uphill hike, during which the glacial waters slowly come into view. There are trains from Venice to Calalzo di Cadore, from which a shuttle bus takes you to Cortina.

Find trains to Calalzo di Cadore

Night Traveller

This fantastic shot of Le Odle mountains in Italy’s Bolzano province was also captured by Zanvettor. The mountains, known as the Geisler group in German, are part of the Puez Geisler Nature Park. Their north faces are some of the most recognisable (and photographed) of the Dolomites, dropping 1000m into the valley (di Funes) below. Sass Rigais, one of 2 tallest peaks is accessible by via ferrata which opens up the route to a wide variety of hiking abilities. From Bolzano there is a bus to Val Gardena, the start of the trail.

Find trains to Bolzano

Dolomites

Karsten Wrobel is an amateur (yet fabulously talented) photographer who is passionate about nature and travel photography. This striking image was taken in the vicinity of the “Tre cime de Lavaredo” in the Sesto Dolomites. Near to the Austrian border, this area has spectacular trails for all abilities. Val Pusteria, where many a hike begins and ends is reached by train from Bolzano with a change at Fortezza.

Find trains to Brunico-Bruneck

Fire Star Trails

Sintra-Cascais is one of Portugal’s 13 natural parks protected by the Portuguese government. Jorge Feteira is a computer programmer by day with a less than secret extracurricular passion for photography. His favourite subject is the sea, so he counts himself fortunate to live within moments of glorious sandy beach, including Praia de Adraga where this fantastic photograph – which experimenting with night-time shooting and long exposure – was taken.

Find trains to Sintra

Volcano Eruption

When Eyjafjallajökull volcano erupted in Iceland in 2010 it created the highest level of air travel disruption since the Second World War. If you were one of many waiting to go on spring break, it’s something you’ll already know too well! Gunnar Gestur Geirmundsson did what any serious photographer would and headed on down to capture this awesome shot. For brave readers, you can take a ferry to Iceland from Hirtshals in Denmark and get up close and personal with nature. Eruptions subject to volcanic activity! For ferry times, check here.

Find trains to Hirtshals

October Night

This fantastic aurora borealis shot was taken by Tommy Eliassen, in Mo-i Rana, Norway. His main interests are night-time, time-lapse and landscape photography, an art which from the countless examples on his Facebook page, he is constantly perfecting. During the winter season in Norway, the Northern Lights – nature’s spectacular natural light show – can be seen, varying in intensity from white, green to deep red.

Find trains to Mo-i-Rana

For the images in all their hi-res glory, see the larger format images in the gallery below. What’s your fave? We’re going to go ahead and say it’s impossible for us to pick just one!

The psychological impact on the reader is telling. Such a view drains the colour and cultural richness from any radically hopeful visions of the future. If we’re not burning in a globally-warmed hell, we’ll be roaming around shell-shocked at the pace at which we eventually made change. Those who were skeptics to the last will hang their heads in shame, submitting to the ones sporting smug smiles who had warned all along this would happen.

Loco2 has been thinking about climate change and carbon right from the word go and we know how easy it is to fall into the same category and start criticising people left right and centre: “Politicians are lazy and self-interested, why can’t they do the simple things needed to make things right?! Creating a fully sustainable and equitable global economy is simple – damn their cynical power-hungry ways!”.

The problem is that it’s not always that simple. The notion that people in power are laughing to themselves at how closely they have followed their financial backers’ interests is a bit far-fetched; more often they are probably simply as incapable as the rest of us at coming up with solutions.

It’s easy to complain about where people are going wrong, but we can also choose to stop getting depressed and concentrate on some of the exciting things that are being achieved. From hugely promising electric vehicle companies to increases in green energy investment and job creation, it’s easy to sell the sizzle.

Focusing on a positive message allows us to pass it along like a baton in a relay race. As we realise our individual responsibility as part of a collective, we can see the visions of change that go beyond the insecurities of celebrity culture and quick-fix, debt-financed consumerism. Celebrating small successes (often on a local level) and sharing those with others revitalises perspectives and gives us purpose within our own communities.

What on earth has this all got to do with travel though? The answer is that travel is all about cultural exchange, and it’s by letting ideas evolve organically through a fun and relaxed dialogue with our peers around the world, that we’ll get somewhere else that isn’t the grey future painted by some environmentalists. Let’s build a future for travel that safeguards the positives and takes the negatives with a pinch of salt.

We might have a travel sector dominated by cheap flights and huge carbon footprints, but low carbon train travel is growing and it’s a fun bandwagon to jump on. To quote an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, “Although rail transport is one of the most energy efficient modes today, substantial opportunities for further efficiency improvements remain. Reduced aerodynamic drag, lower train weight, regenerative breaking and higher efficiency propulsion systems can make significant reductions in rail energy use”.

Now, we concede that we are massive geeks, but that definitely gets us excited…

Created by: Healthcare Management Degree
Image: by JMC Photos reproduced with thanks under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND 2.0 Licence

If it’s unseasonally tropical where you are right now, or you’re trapped in the seasonal limbo that is Britain, fear not, for Loco2 has done the groundwork for you (‘snow problem!) and assembled a gallery of snowy vistas from around Europe. In fact, there is one frosty image for each of the 12 days of Christmas – don’t say we’re not good to you!

If looking at pretty pictures just doesn’t cut it then check out our forthcoming skating blog for help planning your own trip to Europe’s frozen wilderness.

12 days of Christmas in the snow…

New Year’s Eve in Holland is actually called Old Year’s Evening. Nevertheless, Amsterdam is an incredible place to bring in the New Year. If you’re looking for the ultimate place to party, then head along to the main strip, where the streets and pubs will be awash with party goers. Check out this video to really get in the mood…

The train to Amsterdam is so easy and only takes 15 minutes longer than flying. Hop on the Eurostar to Brussels – a fast and comfy journey – then jump aboard the InterCity train to Amsterdam, which runs almost hourly during the day. The journey itself takes around two and a half hours, and goes via Antwerp and The Hague.

Search for trains to Amsterdam

Hornschlittenrennen (no we can’t pronounce it either!)

Book a day off work on January 6 and treat yourself to a little bit of German fun. The Hornschlittenrennen (which translates as the horn runners’ race) is a Bavarian tradition involving teams of four sliding down an icy piste at Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Over 100 teams battle for the winning spot, and it’s an extreme and exhilarating spectacle to observe…
The Garmisch-Partenkirchen train station is on the main Munich to Innsbruck line, with frequent connections. Take a train from London and change at Paris for an overnighter on the Paris-Münich train.

Search for trains to Garmisch-Partenkirchen

Get a bit Mallorcan in Barcelona

Over the last weekend of January, Barcelona’s Mallorcan district Gràzia hosts the annual Sa Pobla festival. With bonfires in the street and a vibrant procession of dancers, red devils and drummers, festival goers pay homage to San Antoni, the patron saint of animals. Dance in the procession, bring your own drums, or just watch the parade behind your pint in the safety of a roadside bar. Residents are famous for their rowdiness during this festival so line your stomach with some tasty Mallorcan street food – try Tumbet or Arroz Brut {which translates as ‘dirty rice’)- and join the party.

Jump on a morning Eurostar to Paris before taking an afternoon TGV to Figueres. Make sure you get a window seat as the views of the rolling countryside are spectacular. At Figueres, the connecting train will take you directly into Barcelona. No hunting for expensive taxis, no baggage reclaim, just straight to the party. The festival is at the Plaça del Diamante and the nearest metro stop is Fontana on the green line.

Search for trains to Barcelona

Emily Rycroft is Editorial Assistant at Global Cool and is collaborating with Loco2 on a series of Traincation themed posts for Loco2. So be sure to come back next month, and in the meantime, follow the conversation on Twitter:

Follow @traincationFollow @Loco2

Images by InfoMallorca.net  and Hornschlitten.eu reproduced with thanks under a CC Attribution license 2.0

The development of train travel in the 19th century meant that destinations around the UK were opened up to leisure travellers. The glamorous sites of Scarborough or bright lights of Blackpool were suddenly just a few hours away by steam locomotive. Quite rightly, holiday makers grabbed the opportunity to dip their toes in the cool waters at the British seaside, courtesy of this new prosperity.

This is the subject of Michael Kerr’s book, where he asks whether rather than insisting on ever-faster trains and journey times which compare to flights, we should embrace the very slowness for which trains are famed. The topic is surprisingly pertinent to our holiday behaviours today.

On the other side of the argument is Tom Chesshyre, who’s book Tales from the Fast Train presents his account of a series of high-speed adventures across the Continent. The last ten years have witnessed the rapid expansion of the high-speed rail network in Europe and a phenomenon similar to the previous century. The reach, speed and frequency of today’s high-speed trains mean that many destinations in Western Europe are accessible for a weekend break from Britain without the much-maligned short-haul airline experience. The advantage of train travel needs no introduction at Loco2 so there’s no doubt we’re on board with the so-called “new golden age of train travel”. But what do you think?

If you’ve got some time, have a listen and let us know your thoughts. Is faster really better or are we moving too fast? Could the high-speed rail revolution do with slowing down? Answers on a postcard, or the comments box if you’re short on time.

Image: by Leonard John Matthews reproduced with thanks under  Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 2.0 licence

At times it remains hard to separate the proverbial social media wheat from the chaff, and it feels a bit like trying to read the entire contents of the British Library while sprinting through its corridoors. Happily there are a few gems which make participation in the travel Twitterverse that bit more fun.

Countless bloggers, travel writers and travel industry insiders will already know what I’m alluding to: the #TTOT hashtag. When it doesn’t stand for Transtracheal Oxygen Therapy or Turbocharger Turbine Outlet Temperature T.T.O.T means Travel Talk on Twitter. It does what it says on the tin (allows you to share travel experiences) and takes part every Tuesday at 9.30am GMT and 9.30pm GMT which means wherever you are, there’ll be a time slot to suit you. The #TTOT hosts tweet 5 questions chosen by the travel community at 10 minute intervals, labelled Q1, Q2 etc… You can answer with tweets corresponding to the question (A1, A2 etc), simple! Just make sure you use the #TTOT hashtag so others can see your input! At Loco2 we’ve set up a stream, searching #TTOT in Hootsuite and Tweetdeck so that we can follow what others are saying and dive into the conversation.

We had the privilege of interviewing #TTOT’s founding father (our words not his!) Melvin Boecher, intrepid blogger and founder of Traveldudes, who is better known by his Twitter handle @traveldudes. We talk to him about what caused him to start #TTOT, how his passion for travel started at the tender age of 4 and why he’s dedicated himself to sharing the travel tips that guidebooks wouldn’t dream of… naturally with a *teeny* train slant. #allaboard!

1. Where are you from, and how is that a part of you?

I’m from Köln (Cologne) in Germany – the city is a big part of me. Köln is a very open-minded city which makes socialising easy. Going out alone is no issue – you can make friends right away.

2. What is your earliest travel experience?

I traveled for the first time aged 4. My parents took me on a road trip from the US East coast all the way to the Pacific Ocean. I don’t remember much from that trip, but I imagine it was a good first lesson for a future traveller.

3. What inspired Traveldudes?

My friends and I were travelling through Indochina for 3 months and we wanted to share our experiences with our family and friends. So we started Traveldudes.org. At the beginning it was just a blog with diary entries but we soon added our own travel tips. Then, we realized that there were so many more experienced travelers and opened the site for them as well. A paper guidebook is very limited in providing real “insider tips” since so many travellers use these guidebooks. The internet gives us the chance to include many more tips from multiple experienced travellers while making it easy for travellers to find what they’re looking for.

4. How did TTOT/Travel talk on Twitter come about?

I was a co-host of another big travel event on Twitter and when they decided to monetize it without telling anyone it didn’t feel right. It isn’t how I think social media should be, and it turned out many others agreed. So I gave it a go with #TTOT and it was a huge success from the first session. It’s the biggest travel event on Twitter and the hashtag reaches around 2 million people each Tuesday! We run it just for fun without any commercial interest and it’s run by the community. The community submit topics and questions and it’s up to an organising team to choose the best.

5. What’s your favourite European city and do you have any insider tips for travel there?

My hometown Köln really rocks! It’s not on the list for many travellers going to Europe, but everyone who has been to Köln was happy they did. Köln is also easy to reach by train. There is plenty to do, but it’s still quite a relaxed city. We have a fab beer culture, just visit one of the many breweries to find out! It’s also great for shopping and if you like culture, there are some fantastic museums.

6. What is your most memorable train experience?

I just love to ride trains, especially in Asia. I’ve used quite a few night trains and it’s great for seeing the landscape out of a train window. Late at night, it’s nice to just fall asleep with the movement of the carriage. Then you wake up and have travelled a good distance and saved accommodation costs. You still get a good feeling for a country by train. Often train tracks are set back from the roads. It gives you the feeling that it’s just you and the surrounding scenery. Then when you stop at the stations and you see there’s life there. It’s a good mix.

7. What would be your fantasy rail route?

It’s not really a route, it’s more the system. It would be nice to see that every country would use the same techniques and track size. It’s just annoying to travel through different countries and at each border to change trains, just because they have a different track size or train system. I’m talking especially of Europe, where there are still many borders if taking a train. There are none for cars, but try to get from Germany to London. It’s so difficult. Or try to handle the train rides in the UK as a tourist. There are routes with 2-3 different train companies and it’s tough for tourists to get along.

8. If you could share your train carriage with someone famous past/present who would it be?

Mmmhhh… I would prefer just to share the ride with my blogging and social media friends. Famous people are overrated, if you ask me!

9. Do you have any tips for train travellers?

I love to see the scenery or to read a good book. Or just give a go at starting a conversation with the person sitting next to or opposite you. Everybody  has a story to tell and if you ask the right questions, you’ll have an amazing conversation.

10. Do you ever talk to strangers on the train? Have any anecdotes?

Never ever! Just joking… as you can see, I’ve just recommended it.   I remember my first train ride in Thailand. We met some travellers who had been on the road for a while already and were far more experienced than we were. We had some good talks, but one guy… was such a show-off! He repeatedly insinuated we were “amateurs” and he the expert. He was a good example how we don’t want to run Traveldudes.   We prefer help each other and to share experience. That is our priority.

11. What’s in store for Traveldudes? What are your hopes for the future of travel?

In the long term I’ve got plenty of exciting ideas, but they’ll stay a secret! In the next couple of weeks, we’ll have some changes, which will give travellers a bigger and better exposure of their travel experiences. We have some exciting changes for the community but we’ll also make sure that the traveller tips remain top quality. Hopes for the future of travel? I hope that social media will have more influence in travel. Social media brings people together from all over the world. The Travel Talk on Twitter is a fantastic example. I also hope that search results will focus more on social media. I would like to see search results I’m looking for, because they are good and get recommended by people I trust. The time for companies who just have a big budget for search engine optimisation is over. Boring!

Our thanks to Melvin who heads up Traveldudes for giving us an interview, we look forward to catching you at 9.30am sharp next Tuesday!

Follow the conversation here:

Follow @traveldudesFollow @Loco2

Images by AnnaOMline reproduced with thanks under a CC Attribution license 2.0

In the meantime (if you fancy feeling a bit jealous!) check out some photos by clicking on the thumbnails below. I’ve done my best to avoid smugness in the accompanying descriptions…

Luckily for us Jamie is addicted to technology, so we can join him on every step of his trip via Twitter and Kerouapp. Check out the interactive map to trace Jamie’s path across Europe, and receive realtime updates of this bus man’s holiday!

Image: by Eddie Fitzpatrick reproduced with thanks. All rights reserved.

Jamie will also be joined by friends from Snow Carbon, TripAdvisor, Bonjour France, Eurodestination, the Trainline and the Swiss Tourist Board for a journey through France and Switzerland that will take in some of the continent’s most awe-inspiring sights. The climax quite literally, is Jungfraujoch, Europe’s highest station.  At an elevation of 3,454 meters (11,332 ft) it makes our eyes water just thinking about it! There Jamie will peruse the Ice Palace, wonder at the frosty wilderness from the observation platform at the Sphinx Observatory (built by hollowing out a mountain no less) or go husky sledging, if the occasion takes him!

The story so far…

Jamie, a prolific tweeter has not let us down. And has so far has found his way in semi-darkness to board the train at St. Pancras, experienced the “luxury’ of 1st class, lectured on the importance of Twitter, admired the Parisians for their taste in railway architecture and attempted to break the sound barrier (okay maybe we’re slightly exaggerating here). Follow him on Twitter, if only to show you can keep up!

Why, this sounds like far too much fun!

Yes, and we agree which is why we couldn’t pack Jamie off without a little homework. Inspired by a project called HistoryPin, by our friends at WeAreWhatWeDo, and romantic images of railway stations from years gone by, we have made it our mission to catalogue images of old and new of stations across the continent.

We’ve challenged Jamie to take photographs of all the stations en route from the selfsame angle of those we have found in the archive. Can he do it? Time will only tell. In the meanwhile, Jamie will be using Kerouapp to document the highs and lows with words, pictures and video. Read all about it here and come back later to find out if Jamie completed the challenge. To be continued…

Image composite thanks to McGill School of Architecture and Urban 75

1. Santa championships – Switzerland

Teams of Father Christmasses battle it out in the World Santa Championships in Samnaun, Switzerland to be crowned (if you can call a Santa hat a crown!) best Santa. No festive skill is left out, with chimney-climbing, gingerbread-icing and present delivering skills rigorously tested.

When: November 25th-26th | Find trains to Innsbruck

2. Viking ship museum – Norway

Our marauding Viking ancestors were known (and no doubt feared) for their facial growth. Oslo is home to the Viking Ship Museum which is testament to its hairy history, told through scale models, art and life-size replica ships. You can even go the whole hog and learn to sail in a longboat should the occasion take you.

When: when you feel the desire to re-enact Norse history! Find trains to Oslo

3. Naturist resort – Croatia

It may seem a little extreme and very 1970s, but actually Croatia were early pioneers of naturist holidays back in the 1930s, with even Edward VIII venturing to a nudist beach (with Mrs. Simpson who was less keen on sunbathing au naturel). Head to north of Petrcane for miles of golden sand after all – no one looks better in their birthday suit than a man with a beard.

When: when you can dare to bare all! Find trains to Knin

4. World Beard Championships – Austria

It’s a little while off (unless you’re planning to enter, in which case you better start growing that 5 o’clock stubble in earnest) but in 2015, Austria plays host to the World Beard Championships. But with the likes of Jonathan Rice and what we’ve christened his Octo-tache as contenders, the heat is on.

When: 2015 | Find trains to Saltzburg

5. Beard and Moustache competition – Italy

On Puglia’s Salento Peninsula, follically proud Italians descend on the village of Grottiglie, for the annual Barba e Baffi (Beard and Moustache) competition. Facial hair takes on high art as hopefuls enter categories such as English Gent, Dalí and Garibaldi. There are music and food stalls for the hairless and hirsute alike.

When: First week of August every year | Find trains to Grottaglie

6. Craftsmen Fair – Romania

If the Targul Mesterilor Populari sounds a little intimidating, fear not, it’s actually a rather lovely open-air event at Romania’s Village Museum dedicated to the country’s traditional crafts and cottage industries. Head down for more bushy basket-weavers and whiskered wood-carvers than you can shake a razor at, and learn glass-blowing and egg-painting in a workshop from the pros.

When: Annually in May | Find trains to Bucharest

7. Hungarian Moustache Festival

Everyone knows that a moustachioed gentleman exudes good taste, and none more than the Hungarians who take moustache growing to new highs in this annual festival dedicated to upper lip growth. Showstopping tradtional costumes match the decorated faces of all who take part, so you can see why it’s been said, “A moustache without a man in Hungary cannot succeed.”

When: May 22nd 2012 | Find trains to Budapest

Now, a few pointers for facial hair etiquette (hairtiquette?): Should you fret whether your mutton chops (that’s sideburns for those not in the know) err on the side of unfriendly then fear not, as long ago as 1800 men struggled with the same issue. This facial hair reference chart from the era should clear up the issue. While it doesn’t cover all possibilities (times have clearly moved on and forced people to diversify) it helps to know your designer stubble from your chin puff.

If a ‘tache is more your thing, Read This created a taxonomy of types of moustache. Finally if you are currently blissfully hair free and this post has awakened a certain longing for facial growth, Blogadilla have created your own cut-out-and-keep varieties, with the Magnum for the gentlemen and the Frida Kahlo for wannabe moustachioed ladies out there.

Right then, that’s the round up done, would really love to stay and chat, but I mustache!*

*DISCLAIMER: This piece may contain a disproportionate amount of facial hair related puns.

Image by LIFE, Maciej Zytniewski, & EVZ reproduced with thanks under a CC Attribution license 2.0