Mind games - remembering our 1980 Interrail adventure

I could never write an autobiography.

So many memories are extremely hazy, gone for good, or flatly contradicted by family and friends.

It shocks me for example when I mention - in conversation with my mother - something from my childhood and she remembers it completely differently.

I mean, completely differently. The opposite, sometimes, of what I remember.

It’s fascinating actually and it makes me think that most memoirs, unless they are based on contemporaneous diaries, must be wildly inaccurate.

As for people who claim to remember in detail conversations from 20, 30 or 40 years ago, I can’t remember what I or anyone else said this morning!

Anyway I thought it might be interesting to conduct a tiny experiment - two people recalling the same holiday decades after the event.

The idea was prompted by travel correspondent Simon Calder who wrote a column last week about the 50th anniversary of Interrail.

Forty-two years ago I bought an Interrail card and travelled across Europe with a friend from university.

We’re still in touch so I asked him what he remembered of the holiday because I’m damned if I can remember very much at all.

As it happens he remembers even less than me although his brief recollection (which I have published below) fills in one or two gaps.

He also recalls an incident with red wine that, now he mentions it, does come back to me but not in a good way.

Overall though there are still more questions than answers.

Anyway, let’s start with what I remember, beginning with a little context.

My story:

It was the summer of 1980.

I had just graduated from Aberdeen University. I had no job and very little money.

My friend Dougie, from Paisley, suggested we go Interrailing.

To put this in perspective there was a time when Interrailing was the thing for students and young people on a tight budget.

Buy an Interrail card (students qualified for a special rate) and you could enjoy unlimited rail travel almost anywhere in Europe with no further travel costs unless you upgraded (to a couchette, for example, which was an unimaginable luxury).

In an era where low cost air travel didn’t exist millions of young people took advantage of the scheme.

It was a great way to have a relatively cheap holiday and see something of the continent.

I can’t remember the price of the ticket - £90 perhaps which would be £310 today - but having come off a short summer job I could just about afford it so I jumped at the chance.

Prior to that I had been abroad just twice - to the Algarve in 1971 and Cavtat (near Dubrovnik) in 1973 - each time on a family holiday.

Now we were planning a rail journey from London to Athens and back via France, Italy and Yugoslavia.

The curious thing is how little either of us remember of that trip.

It was long before the Channel Tunnel so we would have caught the boat train to Paris from Victoria Station.

The boat train, which I subsequently travelled on several times pre-Eurostar, would leave London around 8.00pm and arrive in Dover two or three hours later.

After a short wait in the ferry terminal passengers would board the boat and we would cross the Channel, arriving in Calais around 4.00 or 5.00am.

There we would disembark and board another train, this one to Paris, arriving at the Gare du Nord in time for breakfast.

On this occasion I don't remember staying in Paris on the outbound journey. Instead it was straight on to the next train and our next destination - Italy.

Ah, Italy. That was where we made our first mistake, although Dougie doesn’t seem to remember this at all. As I recall though we got on a fast train that didn’t stop where we expected it to, leaving us much further south than we intended to go.

We did however get to walk round some ruins that may (or may not) have been Pompeii. (Note: it wasn't. See below.)

Back on track (literally) we headed to Venice before catching another train that was going all the way to Athens via Yugoslavia.

We had no intention of getting off in Yugoslavia, the one country where police officers came on board and rigorously checked passports and other travel documents, so we settled down for the long haul.

When I say ‘settled down’ I mean in the corridor. In keeping with the casual nature of the trip we hadn’t booked seats and every one was taken, but even if we had reserved seats I doubt we would have been able to sit in them.

At risk of upsetting an entire nation, the Italians didn't seem to recognise reserved seating. Or that was how I interpreted the chaos.

Actually it was worse than that. Even though they claimed every seat, reserved or otherwise, they seemed to spend almost as much time on their feet, walking up and down the corridors where we, poor things, were trying to read or (occasionally) sleep.

Eventually it got too much. We needed a break so somewhere in Yugoslavia we got off. (Note: Dougie remembers this differently and his story is much better. I think it’s probably true too.)

The next day it was back on another Athens-bound train, equally packed with not a seat to spare. The corridors were full too so there was no choice. The only available space was directly outside a toilet.

The problem was the train was not just over-crowded. As we headed south the weather got progressively hotter and the toilet began to smell. Welcome to Greece!

When we finally got to Athens it was so hot we left the city and caught another train that was heading to the coast.

I don't remember having a plan. We just wanted to be near the sea because we thought it would be cooler.

An hour out of Athens the train stopped. It wasn’t the end of the line but it was by the sea and the small town looked quite nice so we got off.

It was mid afternoon however and everything was shut.

We had to wait two or three hours for the bars, restaurants and guest houses to open so we sat on the edge of the beach under some trees. (I may have made that up but I don't think so.)

Thankfully we then found a place to stay and made our way to a restaurant where we sat outside as the town slowly woke up.

I can't remember the name of the place but we stayed there for several days (I think) before returning to Athens.

And, yes, Athens was still very hot but we found a hostel with a roof terrace overlooking the city and for the next few nights that's where we slept because after dark it was cooler on the roof than in the dormitories.

And that, curiously enough, is what I remember most about Athens. Not the Parthenon/Acropolis (which we visited under the baking midday sun) but sleeping under the stars with the lights of the city twinkling in the background.

As for the return journey from Athens to Italy via Yugoslavia and then back to Paris, all I remember is that it was far less stressful than the outbound journey.

As for Paris, where we stayed for one or two nights before going home, my principal memory is not what you might expect.

Having gone without much food for several days I remember we were extremely hungry and one of the first ‘restaurants’ we saw in Paris was a McDonald’s.

It was 1980. Neither of us had ever seen a McDonald’s before - not in London, Aberdeen or Paisley – let alone eaten in one.

Hard to believe in 2022 but this was our first time and it just happened to be in the home of haute cuisine.

I can’t remember what I ordered - a Big Mac probably - but it was arguably the most delicious thing I ate on that entire trip.

Our Interrail journey ended the next day, back in London. I think we were away for three weeks but I could be wrong.

There were no mobile phones of course so no-one back home knew where we were or where we were staying because we made it up as we went along.

We kept to our broad schedule but it was subject to change every day.

But what does Dougie remember? Even less than me, it turns out:

I think we probably moved through Paris and ended up in Venice?

Then we took a train to Greece but got on the wrong bit of the train and got turfed off in Skopje, Yugoslavia. So we spent the night in a police cell?

Then we got to Athens where we met a couple of South London wide boys who took us round the restaurants of central Athens.

Then we went west (to Corinth?) where we stayed with some market guy who gave us huge peaches.

Then we ended up in Paestum with its Graeco-Roman ruins.

And in the hostel a young fella vomited red wine over you from the upstairs bunk!

Thanks, I had forgotten about that but it's all coming back to me now.

The name Paestum rings a bell but I was convinced the ruins we visited were in southern Italy, somewhere between Rome and Naples.

Did we visit two abandoned cities? I find it hard to believe. One is enough but Dougie seems sure we visited Paestum in Greece so I'll bow to his memory on that.

As for being on the wrong part of the train and getting kicked off in Skopje, that also has a ring of truth to it but you’d think I would remember spending the night in a police cell.

Either way it’s a better story than mine.

On reflection I suspect that we probably stayed in Athens before going on to Corinth, rather than the other way round, because that seems more logical.

Perhaps the strangest thing is that neither of us have a clear recollection of visiting Venice, one of the most famous - if not unique - cities in the world.

I've definitely been to Venice but I wasn’t certain it was on that trip. However I can't remember any other time I've sat and had a coffee in St Mark's Square so we can't both be wrong. Can we?

Nevertheless, and even with these hazy memories, Interrail was great value and if you want to explore multiple destinations in Europe on a limited budget it's still the best way to travel – as long as you book seats in advance on longer journeys!

Update: Dougie adds that “The ruins of Paestum feature prominently in Goodbye Mr Chips. Not that we knew that at the time.”

PS. If anyone else has any memories of Interrail or the places I have mentioned do post them in the comments.

All photos courtesy of Dougie who is behind the camera in every one except the photo above where he is sitting, centre, on the steps of the Acropolis. In the photos below, including the one where I am lying down in the corridor on the train, I’m the one wearing glasses! The other guys are the South London boys we were with in Athens. "Looks as though we met them on the train,” says Dougie. “One was called Lawrie and they were Crystal Palace fans." Funny what you remember.