Is Solo Interrailing Actually Lonely? What No One Tells You

Ask anyone who’s done it and they’ll tell you solo interrailing was one of the best things they’ve done. Ask them a follow-up question and most will also admit there were a few evenings they’d rather forget.

Both things are true, and the gap between them is where most of the anxiety about going alone actually lives. So here’s the honest answer, not the highlight-reel one.

The version everyone posts is real, but incomplete

The photos are accurate. The sunsets, the trains, the spontaneous decisions nobody had to agree to first, all of that genuinely happens, and it’s a real part of why people do this.

What doesn’t make it into the photos is the specific, ordinary kind of lonely that shows up in the gaps between those moments. Not tragic, not a sign anything’s gone wrong. Just the quiet stretch of an evening in a city where you don’t know a single person yet.

When it actually hits

It’s rarely the whole trip. It’s specific moments, and they’re fairly predictable once you know what to look for:

• The first evening in a new city, especially if you arrive later than planned and don’t have the energy to go find people.
• Meal times, oddly more than most other moments. Eating alone is fine in theory and can feel very exposed in practice, especially early on.
• Between connections — a long train journey, a delayed transfer, the kind of dead time that gives you too much room to think.
• After a genuinely good day with people you then have to say goodbye to, because travelling solo means the good connections are often short ones.

Recognising the pattern helps, because it turns “I feel lonely, something’s wrong with this trip” into “it’s 6pm on day one in a new city, this is the predictable bit.”

Solitude and loneliness aren’t the same thing

Solo travel involves a lot of solitude, choosing your own schedule, not owing anyone a conversation, being able to change plans without checking with anyone. Most people who choose to travel alone actively want that, and a lot of what looks like “the hard part” from outside is genuinely enjoyable once you’re in it.

Loneliness is different. It’s solitude you didn’t choose, showing up at a moment you’d have preferred company. The two get lumped together because they look identical from the outside (one person, alone, in an unfamiliar place), but they feel completely different from the inside.

The honest goal for a solo trip isn’t zero solitude. It’s minimising the unwanted kind, without giving up the parts of travelling alone that are actually the point.

What people who’ve worked in hostels notice

Anyone who’s spent time working front desk or common-room shifts at a busy hostel sees the same pattern on repeat. Someone arrives, checks in, and spends the first evening hovering at the edge of the common room, clearly wanting to talk to someone and not quite finding the in.

By day two or three, most people have found their people, through a shared dorm, a walking tour, a kitchen conversation that ran long. But that first evening is disproportionately the hard one, for almost everyone, regardless of how outgoing they normally are. It’s not a personality problem. It’s a timing problem: you’ve arrived somewhere with zero social infrastructure and you’re expected to build some from scratch, on the spot, while tired from travelling.

What actually helps

A few things make the hard stretches shorter, without requiring you to become a different kind of person for the trip:

1. Book a social hostel for your first night or two in a new place, even if you’d rather have privacy later in the trip. The first night is when a common room does the most work.
2. Say yes to the low-effort invite. A walking tour, a hostel-organised pub crawl, whatever’s happening that evening. The activity matters less than being in a room with other people who are also new.
3. Plan the arrival, not just the itinerary. Arriving somewhere at 11pm with nothing sorted is a different experience to arriving at 4pm with time to actually settle in before dinner.
4. Know in advance if anyone else is around. This is the part most planning advice skips. If you already know someone else is arriving in the same city the same day, the first-evening problem mostly disappears, because there’s a reason to reach out before you’ve even landed.

That last one is most of what finding a travel companion for your next trip actually solves. Not eliminating solitude, just making sure the moments you’d rather not be alone for aren’t left entirely to chance.

FAQ

Is it normal to feel lonely while interrailing solo?

Yes, and it’s one of the most commonly reported parts of solo travel that doesn’t get talked about much. It tends to show up in specific moments (first evenings, mealtimes, long transit) rather than across the whole trip.

How do you deal with loneliness while travelling alone?

Book social accommodation for your first night or two in a new place, say yes to low-effort group activities, and where possible, know in advance if anyone else is heading the same way at the same time.

Is solo travel worth it if you sometimes feel lonely?

Most people who’ve done it say yes, and the loneliness tends to be occasional rather than constant. The solitude you chose (freedom, flexibility, no compromise on plans) is usually worth the odd quiet evening.

What’s the difference between loneliness and solitude when travelling?

Solitude is time alone you actually wanted. Loneliness is time alone you didn’t. Solo travel involves a lot of the first and only occasional stretches of the second, but they can feel similar in the moment.

You don’t have to find out the first night alone

The first evening in a new city is the one that catches most people off guard, and it’s also the most fixable part of the whole thing, if you know someone else is around before you arrive.

That’s what we’re building at Antur: match with other solo travellers on your actual route and dates, so you’re not hoping to bump into someone on the night. The waitlist’s open if you’ve got a trip coming up.