I MET my wife Interrailing around Europe when we were both footloose and fancy-free. It was my 16-year-old Tara who came up with the idea that we should do a wee Interrail trip as a family, so it is off to my kids’ pick of Italy we go for a rail adventure.
It seems our break is bang on trend. Checking in at the swish Hilton Lake Como (www.hilton.com), the receptionist smiles when I tell him how the trip came about: “In our 2025 Trends Report, 60% of parents said they book a Kidcation with the kids choosing where to go”.
I like the idea of a “Kidcation” interrail adventure, even more when we’re soon swimming in the rooftop pool with the lake spreading before us and hulking hills towering above. Lake Como reminds me of the Great Glen, but with palm trees and lusher vegetation painted in.
Lake Como is made for exploring, with a network of ferries that busies around this deeply scenic lake. Lenno brings the Villa Balbianello, which 13-year-old Emma insists we visit as it starred in Star Wars. Again it proves a great choice, with cloud-white butterflies rejoicing in the rich flora in its verdant lakeside gardens.
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Varenna is the postcard-perfect charmer, the path connecting its historic core to the ferry hanging camera-pleasingly over the water. Bellagio impresses with precipitous steps tackling the steep slopes and a shop with fresh sauce-kissed pasta to go.
A perfect day finishes off with a rooftop dinner at Terrazza 241, with its lobster risotto and spot-on steaks; Lake Como wines too.
As the moon shimmers across the lake below we plot our continuing rail adventures together on a map of Italy.
Looking for even more water all around us we head for Venice, activating the second day on our five-day Interrail pass, which we have up to a month to use. No more having to root around for my dog-eared paper pass, as it’s all handily in an easy-to-navigate app. I’ve booked our longer journeys in advance so we have seat reservations. So we scoot across northern Italy at speeds faster than any Scottish train with stress-free ease.
There is something about travelling by train that surpasses any other mode of transport. Scotland’s Robert Louis Stevenson, a man deeply enamoured with the railways, talked of “travelling for travel’s sake” and the “great affair is to move”. I feel the same, this being my eighth Interrail trip.
It’s a joy seeing the kids take so well to the rails. I give them the responsibility of finding what platform we’re leaving from and leading us to our seats, hoping the rail bug rubs off.
These days, Interrail handily has a lot of flexibility built in. You can go classic, as I always did before, and enjoy an all-country pass that gives you the freedom of Europe’s rails, a great feeling in these Brexit-restricted times. This Global Pass option opens up unlimited travel in an impressive 33 countries. Note you sometimes have mandatory reservations and small supplements to pay on special trains like our Frecciarossa high-speed services.
The other big choice is between a Flexipass or Continuous Pass, the former offering a set number of days, the latter travel every day of the pass validity. I found it all really easy to sort on Rail Europe’s website.
I’ll be writing about visiting Venice on a budget – spoiler alert, it is possible – for you soon, so suffice to say, the girls are delighted at being back in one of their favourite cities “playing on the ferries” that funnel up and down the Grand Canal.
Next up, we spend a night in Verona wrapped up in the romance of Romeo and Juliet, before changing our plans for onward travel. That is the beauty of Interrail – the sheer flexibility of having your own rail pass.
We veer south in just an hour and a half to Florence and see David strutting his stuff at Uffizi Galleries and taste what I once told the girls is the best gelato in Italy. I stick by that and they are so impressed we go there twice.
All too soon, it is time to turn tail and head north back to Milan.
Tara has been so focused on her shopping adventures here, she has saved up her spending money. We just browse the seriously fancy boutiques from the international fashion names she knows from TikTok and seek our own second-hand bargains at a Saturday flea market.
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We often spend the October holidays on the Algarve’s beaches, but all four of us agree that this nostalgic rail adventure around Italy has hit all the holiday bases, with the Interrail system proving even easier to use these days.
And my wife Jenny and I didn’t miss panicking about losing our well-thumbed paper passes once.
I ask Tara if she would like to enjoy her own Interrail adventure with her pals. She cheekily replies: “Yes, you never know who I might meet.”
Interrail and other rail passes (and tickets) are available through Rail Europe (www.raileurope.com). easyJet (www.easyjet.com) fly out to Milan from Edinburgh.
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