Trains

by Jay Brunhouse

I read with interest the reader’s account of being required to pay money to agents on a train traveling from Chisinau, Moldova, to Kiev, Ukraine (Dec. ’08, pg. 11).

My wife, Margaret, and I spent a week in the Ticino region of Switzerland and another week in Venice, both stays organized by Untours (Media, PA; 888/868-6871). Untours provides apartment accommodations, transfers and on-site hosts who give advice and an orientation.

by Jerry Gordon, Riverside, CA

I was looking through the sale books in an airport bookstore when a nonfiction by one of my favorite writers, David McCullough, caught my eye. In “The Path Between the Seas,” written more than 30 years ago, McCullough tells the story of the Panama Canal from 1870 to 1914.

Taking advantage of some frequent-flyer miles on United Airlines, I decided to travel to Spain on my own, May 10-27, 2008. It had been 10 years since my late husband and I had been in Spain, and I wanted to revisit the south.

Although I have Spanish friends near Madrid, I decided to join the hospitality organization SERVAS (US SERVAS, Inc., 1125 16th St., Ste. 201, Arcata, CA 95521-5585; 707/825-1714, www.usservas.org) in order to meet new people and have some personal contacts during my travels.

A reader reported a very negative experience taking a train from Oslo to Stockholm in July ’07 (Oct. ’08, pg. 18). In contrast, our trip from Stockholm to Oslo on Aug. 8, 2008, was very pleasant.

Many travelers book hotel rooms in advance for the first and last nights of their trips but wing it for all the nights in between. Some just start out cold, blowing with the wind. We asked you independent travelers to tell us how you go about finding nonreserved rooms in places you’ve never been to overseas and to answer the following questions.

On July 29, 2008, I dropped my wife at the Brussels airport at around 7:15 a.m. and then caught the train to Brussels Midi. I arrived there just before 8:00.

Hi, Jay! We are planning a 30-day trip to Europe and plan to use a Eurail pass. We have a few questions.

The management and staff of Rail Travel Center (125 Main. St., Box 205, Putney, VT 05346; 800/458-5394, www.rail travelcenter.com) will be retiring in 2010. They are planning to fill their last two years with old favorites as well as some new tours.

I have been on several of their tours and have always been pleased. Indeed, their “Springtime in the Alps,” which I took 10 years ago, unquestionably remains the best tour I have ever been on. We stayed in three cities and made day trips using the Swiss rail card.