Today’s trip is the first leg of what is planned to be over 9000km worth of trip to round off the year. It’s also likely to be the last trip of this sabbatical, so I’m trying to make it count.

This trip is going to have: Marchés de Noël, a Hot Tub Party, a ride on the last remaining Danglebahn to complete the set, Weinachtsmarkts, the #ICEAgeChallenge, a dangleway over the Rhine, Kriskindlmarkts, a new country - Sweden, a little mermaid, Junlemarkeder, Hotels that are “unfeasably close to the station”, a pod cabin on a Ferry, Julmarknader, two new Talgo 230 trains, and Saunas.

Oh, and did I mention Christmas Markets?

The full itinerary can be previewed here: trainlog.me/public/tag/5491013…

Stay tuned in to see what I get up to this next couple of weeks…

Swan Song Trip - December 2025

9090 km in 🇩🇪 🇸🇪 🇩🇰 🇫🇷 🇪🇸 🇺🇳

^trainlog.me

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La France… Je suis à vous!

I obviously decided to celebrate it with some slightly battered artisanal croissants… that I picked up in Spain, because I know full well how terrible the SNCF ones are. The somewhat now expected police doing the annoyingly regular and thus likely illegal border check did not object to them, so that’s something.

My train tracker over at viaduct.world informs me that I have now crossed the Tunel de Perthús - the main high speed link between France and Catalunya - 22 times, with a 23rd happening before the end of the year.

As such, I know that this now becomes the start of when we have decent cellular coverage, at least until the start of the high speed section at Nîmes.

(CW: some battered but delicious croissants)

viaduct. The platform for train enthusiasts.

Use viaduct to keep a free record of your train journeys, from short commutes to epic cross-country adventures.

^{viaduct.world}

One of the absolute pleasures of travelling by train on this route is being able to do the section between Perpignan and Narbonne, especially on a Duplex train.

On this section, you have a whole load of marshes and salt flats as well as a couple of larger lakes that create some delightful scenery, and the train line goes right through the middle of some of these marshes. The main road is a little further to the east, and much further away from the edge of these lakes, so you get a unique view from the train.

If you catch the right time of year you will see hundreds, if not thousands, of flamingos on the lakes. This time there were only a few dozen.

Sadly, we must give up some of the nicer things in life in the name of progress, and the Ligne Nouvelle Montpellier-Perpignan is due to replace this as the main access to Spain from France, but not til the 2040s

Definitely worth going past during the daytime, or if you can swing it, during a sunset.

Another of the experiences that doesn’t get old, part of the ritual of this line that is the first I encounter on a trip, is when the train leaves Nîmes, and we hit the LGV Sud-Est, and the driver puts his hand forward and turns the speed up.

Today’s driver, Jean-Jacques, just got on the loudspeaker to wish us all a pleasant ride as we go at a leisurely 280km/h up the high speed line. Which I felt was a nice touch, as well as a bit of well-deserved bragging.

I am still amazed that I am on the top floor of a 200m long train the size of a small skyscraper on its side, that can travel at 300km/h as I listen to synthwave and tap away on a laptop. This never ceases to bring me a little joy, and it seems somewhat more real than the abstract feeling of flying point-to-point, where you can’t see anything but the land in th distance below you moving seemingly slowly.