If you’re planning a trip to Europe and tossing up between the budget internal flights and the trains, my advice is to choose the trains. I got a first class Eurail pass – it cost about 500 Euros and the reservations are extra but the first class is luxurious. I feel like a thin person in the seat, it is that big and comfy. I even had to move the tray table closer so I could type. There is a buffet car so you can walk around. In first class there is coffee, bottled water and fruit available at the end of the carriage. There is a power connection near your seat and (for a price) there is wireless internet on the train. When you factor in the time you have to spend in the airport, the fact that you have to put your bag in the hold (so it can get lost) and the price of getting from the airport to the centre of town (in Stockholm, for example, it cost about $A40 and 20 minutes by train from the airport while the trains actually drop you in the centre), the train is definitely a better alternative. [‘What Difference does it make?’ – The Smiths – can’t beat a bit of the depressive Mr Morrissey]

The trip south from Stockholm took me through more varied countryside than the trip through Finland. There was snow again and some of the familiar Christmas card shots were there but as we got further south there were more farms and field with smatterings of snow and a lot of frozen lakes. My friend at the train station had said this was the first real winter Sweden had seen in a while and he and his friends were getting out on the lakes with long (I guess cross country) skates. [‘Debaser’ – The Pixies – probably my fave Pixies track – probably because it’s more Ms Deal and less Mr Francis]. So I’ve just crossed the bridge across the sea and arrived in Denmark – time to pack up to get off the train and hassle those visa people.

On the way to Copenhagen

Snow covered plains – Stockholm to Copenhagen

The Swedish love an umlaut