It’s a familiar scene in Fethiye. You’re in a strange cafe/bar/restaurant and at the next table you hear people speaking English and you say ‘Hello’, and it turns out they are here on holiday, so you have a nice chat.

You do not expect this to happen in the frozen north east of Turkey in Kars, where we are regularly stopped on the street by locals who rarely see a foreigner. 

However, this morning in the hotel’s breakfast room there were two English men. 

It turned out they were retired Brits, on Inter-rail passes, indulging their love of trains by rattling along the tracks all over Turkey.
 
They left to catch the 8.30am to Kayseri, from there they’ll continue to Adana and then on to Diyabakir.

Adventurous souls whose only minor complaint was the fact that, over the past ten years or so, Turkey has updated all its rolling stock so the glorious days of sleeper carriages manufactured in UK, and finished in walnut and burgundy plush, are no more.

Still they are knocked out by the scenery and already planning a return visit.

Maybe Turkey should market train tourism but the again maybe they needed to keep the old rolling stock too?

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