About luggage storage and the fear of not being in the system. My first interview, the start of an adventure and a few thoughts from my diary.

This blogpost will be about the difficult bits. Travelling is always an adventure, but it’s never easy. I had to deal with some adversities and leave a lot of mental luggage behind.

I’m not sure when I will find the time to write this post, at the moment this is a placeholder, and a reminder for myself to not only share the glossy bits.

The World’s Greatest Train

As I’m writing this (Oktober 2021), I am just back from the train journey of a lifetime. The Connecting Europe Express was one of the European Year of Rail’s most emblematic initiatives. Crossing 26
European countries in 36 days, this special one-time train was on a mission to inspire and connect Europeans everywhere. 40 railway partners worked hand in hand to make this project possible and to promote sustainable transport and travel. I wanted to be a part of this project from the moment I first heard about it, and I had the honour and the privilege to be on board for the first half of the journey. I started sharing about this journey on my Instagram account, and didn’t only post the landscapes I saw, but also shared my thoughts and experiences. This is when I realized how great is is to not only show artistic works, but share human stories or even (dramatic music)… a picture without blur!!!

Opening my Diary to the World…

Blogging is new to me, and most likely it’s my perfectionism that had stopped me from ever trying. That and the feeling that I might not have anything important to say. But I’ve practised sharing imperfect posts on my journey, I simply didn’t have the time to polish everything up. And I got such lovely feedback, and started deep conversations that mean so much to me. So now I’m curious how I’ll take to the blogging format, and looking forward to hearing your feedback. I’ll start by reworking my Instagram content into blogposts, for those amoung us that don’t feel at home in the Facebook empire…
When my current projects settle down a bit (Calendar, reworking the website, establishing print processes), I’ll start writing exclusive content for the blog. About railway history, the magic of travelling, about perception and the love of nature. I have enough ideas, and I’m happy to hear yours!

From my travel diary, September 1st, 2021

Stairway into the nothingness…
I avoid flying whenever possible, but today, I had to. The Connecting Europe Express is starting in Lisbon tomorrow, and I’m on board for part of the journey. And my inability to get there without flying just emphasises the point of this train. It would have taken me two days to get there by train, a journey that I couldn’t have booked all in one go, and with no backup plan if one of the trains had a delay. One of the demands in connection to the EU Year of Rail is that booking international connections gets easier, and passenger rights don’t stop at the borders.
Of course, the pandemic isn’t helping. There used to be a pretty good night train from the French-Spanish border to Lisbon, but this connection has been discontinued in March 2020, with unclear prospects for the future. The different gauge in Portugal and Spain is another added challenge.
However, I hope the Connecting Europe Express will contribute to making this kind of travel easier in the future. Even though it’s sometimes nice to see our world from above… the future is in trains!