Trivia: How far can you get in 24 hours from the UK (International edition_

[alex17595]

Inspired by the UK thread which comes up from time to time, how far can you get from the UK in 24 hours. You can start from anywhere in the UK and go to the continent but you must meet any check in times.

 

[Adlington]

Flight QF10 Heathrow-Perth-Melbourne, scheduled time 21h55m. Leaves two hours (and five minutes) for check-in....

 

[alex17595]

Flight QF10 Heathrow-Perth-Melbourne, scheduled time 21h55m. Leaves two hours (and five minutes) for check-in....

I was looking for surface transport really, its a bit too easy with planes


To start off:

0922 London - Paris 1247
Cross Paris 1Hr 13
1407 Paris Lyon - Barcelona 2054
2115 Barcelona - Madrid 0002


1670km

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

I think you can reach Villa San Giovanni (ferry terminal for Sicily) in 24 hours from St Pancras leaving 0540 via Paris, Torino and Rome.
0540 St Pancras-Paris GdeN 0917
RER D
1041 Paris GdeL-Torino Porta Susa 1618
1630 Torino Porta Susa-Roma Termini 2055
2131 Roma Termini-Villa S Giovanni 0430
You end up on the Sicily sleeper from Rome.

(0640 CET finds you on the ferry crossing to Messina)

Some quick sums suggest the total distance is 2600 km, so an average of about 108 km/h or 67mph.
I can't think of another route from London with as much high speed running.

I think you could also reach almost as far as Lisbon via Paris, Barcelona and Madrid, starting on the 0540 Eurostar and ending on the Lisbon sleeper at Entrocamento at 0606 next day.
This is a similar distance (c2600 km) but takes longer than the more direct route via Hendaye.
The sleeper from Madrid also goes on the old line via Avila and Medina del Campo where it merges with the Hendaye portion.
In fact you could leave St Pancras at 0755 and reach all the way to Lisbon at 0730 on the route via Hendaye. ​

 

[duesselmartin]

London 0701
Paris N 1017
Paris Est 1055
Karlsruhe 1325
Karlsruhe 1355
Berlin Ost 1939
Berlin Ost 2022
Terespol (Eastern Poland ) 0537

 

[alex17595]

Dont forget you get an extra hour as you skip it when going through the chunnel.


There's also this site if you want to calculate distances.
http://raildar.fr/osrm/#11/41.1577/1.6850

 

[TRAX]

I think you can reach Villa San Giovanni (ferry terminal for Sicily) in 24 hours from St Pancras leaving 0540 via Paris, Torino and Rome.
0540 St Pancras-Paris GdeN 0917
RER A
1041 Paris GdeL-Torino Porta Susa 1618
1630 Torino Porta Susa-Roma Termini 2055
2131 Roma Termini-Villa S Giovanni 0430
You end up on the Sicily sleeper from Rome.

(0540 finds you on the ferry crossing to Messina)

I think you could also reach Coimbra in Portugal via Paris, Barcelona and Madrid, starting on the 0540 Eurostar.​

You mean RER B

 

[alex17595]

0647 London - Brussels 1007
1025 Brussels - Koln 1225
1244 Koln - Munich 1705
1705 Munich - Brataslava Petrazalka 2244
10 Min Bus ride to Bratislava hl. st.
2348 Bratislava hl. st. - Strazske Arr. 0740

 

[Amateurish]

Lisbon is doable using the sleeper from Hendaye.

 

[alex17595]

How about:

London 0701 - Paris Nord 1017
Paris EST 1055 - Karlsruhe 1325
Karlsruhe 1400 - Berlin Ostbanhof 1939
Berlin Ostbanhof - Brest 0907*

*Belarus is +3 hours ahead of london.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

You mean RER B

Actually I mean RER D
Or B/A via Chatalet.

 

[TRAX]

Yes D sorry, no idea why I wrote B tired...

 

[cactustwirly]

You can get to Zagreb; via 1058 E* to Brussels, ICE to Munich via Frankfurt and Sleeper to Zagreb, arriving 0835 the following morning

 

[coupwotcoup]

Malaga is doable in a day...if that helps.

 

[Gerald Fiennes]

Ajak, Hungary (nearly at the Ukraine frontier) via the 1258 from Stp, Brussels, Cologne, Munich, Night Train to Budapest (Kelenfold) and then Intercity via Debrecen arrives 1326 the following day (allowing 30mins for ES checkin). But only 1627km as the crow flies, so not as far as the toe of Italy. And slightly more hassle as you need to get from Koeln Hbf to Koeln-Messe Deutz to pick up the fast ICE train within 29mins from arriving... Interestingly, you don't go via Budapest Keleti pu. at all on this itinerary...

 

[JB_B]

Malaga is doable in a day...if that helps.

London to Malaga in just 17h (departing 0540) gets you ~1682 Km away as the crow flies which is excellent but it's hard to make good use of the spare 7 hours.

The best extension I could see was Doncaster to Malaga (departing 22.44) which gets you ~1886 Km in 23h56

Bedford to Villa San Giovanni departing at 0413 Saturdays gets you ~1988 Km in 23h20.

 

[alex17595]

Lisbon is about 2365km via Paris and Hendaye

 

[dutchflyer]

The Dutch Publ. travellers association ROVER has in its magazine ev. year such an overview mapped out, but of course starting from here, Utrecht, centre of NL/NS-railways. Even with coloured lines giving furthest reach for like 6/12/24 hrs or so. Do not have it at hand here, will try to look it up.
There are in fact a very few routes where an INTernational bus (coach for most of you) would be faster as train.

 

[JB_B]

The Dutch Publ. travellers association ROVER has in its magazine ev. year such an overview mapped out, but of course starting from here, Utrecht, centre of NL/NS-railways. Even with coloured lines giving furthest reach for like 6/12/24 hrs or so. Do not have it at hand here, will try to look it up.
There are in fact a very few routes where an INTernational bus (coach for most of you) would be faster as train.

It would be interesting to see that map.

If we're expanding the topic to cover non-UK origins then I suspect that greatest straight-line distance achievable in 24h by rail would be in China - something like

G72:Guangzhou South - Beijing West 07:46 18:22

Z203: Beijing - Haerbin West 20:31 06:47

~2800 Km as the crow flies - I'm sure that can be bettered.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

It depends on your starting/finishing point in the UK, as getting TO or FROM St. Pancake is often the most awkward part. Prague to Batley was done by me in approximately 23h30m though with Leeds to Batley requiring a taxi due to arriving at LDS at 0230.

 

[KingswoodRed]

My wife, daughter and I did the following last August:
10.58 St P
14.05 Brussels
Ending up in Düsseldorf around 5pm.
Restaurant for dinner.
Nightjet (Austrian railways) 8pm ish to Vienna arriving 8.30ish the following morning.
Went onto to Budapest at lunchtime and then after an afternoon/evening sightseeing, on the 10pm Romanian sleeper to Sibiu in Transylvania. Made it there within 48 hours from London.

An excellent trip, but due to us building in long changeover times in stations and some tourism on the way, not the furthest we could get from London in 24 hours....