Having spent a good few hours on trains over Christmas, I have decided that the reason I really enjoy train travel is that - like ferries - they give me an unparalleled opportunity to entertain the contemplation of stunning exemplars of pulchritudinous muliebrity. For some reason there are more than your average expectation of pretty young women on trains. I spent a happy month in the summer pretending to be a student again by backpacking - or rather kit-bagging - around northern Europe and gradually making this pleasant discovery.
Buses are not the same. On buses you just get to stare at the backs of the heads of the people in front, and if anyone comes to sit next to you it is inevitably both unwashed, and the local idiot, complete with Irish Wolfhound. On trains, on the other hand, especially travelling late in the evenings, there seems to be a half-way decent chance that the pretty girl with the tumbling tresses and the sweet smile will ask if anyone is `sitting here'.
It might just be, I suppose, that I am now old and boring-looking enough to be the only person that looks as though it would be safe enough to sit near.