With a bucket list of journeys that would take her from Tromsø to Palermo and Istanbul, our writer rekindles her love affair with long-distance train journeys
S
nug, I stretched in the darkness, waking as the thump of wheels slowed to the tempo of a heartbeat. I could sense that the train was approaching our destination, so shuffled down the berth, easing up the blind to find a ruby necklace of brake lights running parallel with the tracks.
It had rained overnight and the road was slick, the sky a midnight blue, a D-shaped moon fading in the corner. Dawn was minutes away, and I could just make out the jumble of houses on hills, lights flicking on as though fireflies lay between their folds.
I stepped into the corridor as the train curved around a lake that gleamed like a pool of pink metal as first light fell upon its surface. Around me, passengers were now zipping up bags, brushing their teeth and locking berths into place, pausing to look out of the windows as a pair of minarets rose into view like sharpened pencils. Istanbul’s skyline was coming into focus.
