Europe is a big place, this explains why there are so many planes hanging around. This makes sense. However, sometimes stepping off a plane it is hard to judge just how far from home you are, after all you probably fell asleep on the flight so 3 hours could well be 10 hours. To combat this we decided to try taking trains instead. Without a doubt this helped with the sense of distance, especially with some of the 10 hour legs during the day, but on the other hand it also added to the sense of adventure. Now I don't want to give the impression we were slumming it on the trains, often we splashed out on a cabin and even on some crucial moments went for the first class sleeper. Unlike many of our trips there was no jungle, no tents and no large mountain to climb but on the up side there was a large dose of culture, beer o'clock every day and much merriment to be had.