A Singapore Student Rode 28 Trains Home From Scotland

Nicholas Chua rode 28 trains across 14 countries and 21,445km to get home from Edinburgh, then walked the last Russia gap on foot. The NUS electrical engineering student, 25, left Scotland on 28 May 2026 after a five-month exchange and reached Singapore on 12 July, a 46-day haul he paid for with about S$6,000 saved from internships and national service.

Travel features will sell this as wanderlust. The harder fact is the map. There is still no through train from western Europe into Russia, so the ride that looks like one railway is a chain of tickets with a pedestrian bridge in the middle, walked nine days before Estonia cut that post’s evening hours.

The Friendship Bridge Has No Trains

By 6 June he had already come through the United Kingdom, Germany, Poland, Lithuania and Latvia. The next move was a three-hour train from Tallinn to Narva, then a walk into Ivangorod. Vehicles have been barred there since 1 February 2024. Buses drop you on one bank. You cross on foot. Another bus takes you on.

He joined the line at 12.50pm. A heavy rain soaked his duffel and backpack under a travel umbrella. People in the queue offered to sell a place nearer the front, a trade border guides say often goes for about €50. He refused. He cleared Estonian customs around 9.30pm, a wait he later put at about 10 hours, and was held for another 30 minutes on the Russian side while officers took mugshots and opened his phone.

They checked everything, from my albums to my chats. My privacy was gone.

Nicholas Chua, electrical engineering student, National University of Singapore

He said he never felt in real danger. He was not Russian and not from the EU, and most visitors fly into Moscow instead of walking this post. That reading is too kind to the bridge. The queue stands in the open on Peter’s Square, with no shelter, no benches and no toilets. Guards take people in batches of 15 to 25. The bottleneck is on the Estonian side. The Russian hall is often empty.

WHAT THE NARVA QUEUE ACTUALLY DEMANDS

• Daylight only: Bus operators now list the Estonian post as open daily from 07:00 to 19:00 for pedestrians, after a 15 June cut from a 23:00 close.
• Weather: The wait is outdoors, which is how a June downpour soaked his bags halfway through the afternoon.
• Jump offers: Locals still try to sell a closer spot; police sometimes send buyers to the back.
• Phones: Officers on the Russian bank may open albums, chats and browsing history, which is what happened to him for about 30 minutes.

Nine days after he crossed, Estonia’s 19:00 shutdown was in force. July waits of 18 to 25 hours became common, and on 30 June about 300 people were hunting a bed in Narva after missing the close. Had he arrived in mid-June instead of 6 June, the 9.30pm clearance would not have existed.

Singapore Still Threads a Corridor Europe Abandoned

The old glamour of this itinerary was a sleeper that rolled from Paris, Berlin or Warsaw into Moscow. Those trains are gone. The Seat 61 rail guide’s 2026 update is blunt: international trains between western Europe and Russia remain suspended because of the war in Ukraine and sanctions, and none now cross the Poland-Belarus or Finland-Russia borders. Russian domestic trains, including the daily Rossiya from Moscow to Vladivostok, still run. Direct Russia-China sleepers have been down since February 2020, with only a weekly Irkutsk-Ulaanbaatar train back since late 2022 and a weekly Ulaanbaatar-Beijing train since mid-2025.

So the “world’s longest train journey” that YouTube keeps recycling is not a train. It is a set of regional tickets plus a walk across a NATO-Russia footbridge. EU passport holders still stand in that Narva line in the hundreds on busy days. The second cost sits in the advice from home. On 29 June, while Chua was already east of the border, Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs told citizens to defer all non-essential travel to Russia, citing drone strikes on Moscow, St Petersburg and Kazan. Singaporeans need a visa. An e-visa exists, but the ministry warns that it can fail at some land crossings. Mastercard and Visa usually do not work once you are inside the country.

THE RIDE IN FOUR FIGURES

• Distance: 21,445km from Scotland to Singapore, about 2,690km longer than the Portugal-Singapore run he used as a template.
• Trains: 28 services through 14 countries, including Hong Kong as its own stop after mainland China.
• Time: 46 days, with two or three days in each city before the next ticket.
• Cash: about S$6,000, most of it on food and rooms, not on fares.

He told himself the land crossing made sense because he was “just this Singaporean guy.” That is the loophole the route now runs on. A small, visa-eligible passport can still buy the tickets. The trains that used to carry those tickets across the EU-Russia join cannot.

Ninety-Five Hours Among Open Bunks

From Ivangorod he went to St Petersburg and Moscow, walking the Church of the Saviour on Spilled Blood and Red Square. The hard Russian leg was still ahead: a 95-hour run from Moscow to Ulan-Ude, capital of Buryatia, on the Trans-Siberian line that stretches over 9,200km toward Vladivostok. The daily Rossiya covers 9,259km if you stay on to the Pacific. He was not going that far.

He had wanted second class. A mix-up at the Moscow window put him in third. He only saw the open bunks when he boarded.

TRANS-SIBERIAN BERTHS HE WAS CHOOSING BETWEEN

The car was noisy and sleep was poor. It was also the social core of the trip. Passengers changed at city stops, so he kept meeting new people, some heading home from work, some visiting family, some going out for military exercises. They shared snacks and drinks. He used Google Translate. Between talks he ate in the dining car, played a few downloaded films, and watched Siberia slide past for nearly four days.

I think a trip shouldn’t be all smooth sailing. There should be certain challenging parts to it. Without a challenge, it doesn’t make things interesting.

Nicholas Chua, on the Moscow to Ulan-Ude run

He reached Ulan-Ude on 15 June, the same date Estonia’s shorter border hours began behind him, and spent two days in the city. He went up to the Buddhist temple Rinpoche Bagsha Datsan on Bald Mountain and stood under a 42,000kg head of Lenin. Then the rails bent south toward Mongolia.

Why He Copied a Spanish YouTuber’s Map

The template was Ramilla de Aventura, a Spanish YouTuber who in June 2023 posted a Portugal-to-Singapore ride of about 18,755km that has since passed 2.5 million views. Chua tried to follow that path because it had already been walked. He still had to check, on Google and with Gemini and ChatGPT, which trains were alive and which had died.

A lot of the 2023 map is now a museum piece. No western European sleeper reaches Moscow. The classic through trains to Beijing are not back as a single ride. He learned the cash lesson early, when London-Brussels trains failed in May and a prepaid Brussels room went to waste. After that he bought tickets about three days before leaving a city and only then booked a bed.

THE DATES THAT LOCK THE ROUTE

1. 28 May 2026: Leaves Scotland after five months at the University of Edinburgh.
2. May 2026: London-Brussels trains cancel; he loses a Brussels room and stays with a friend.
3. 6 June 2026: Walks Narva to Ivangorod after the long queue, then rides on to St Petersburg and Moscow.
4. 15 June 2026: Reaches Ulan-Ude after 95 hours, the day Estonia’s 19:00 border close takes effect.
5. 12 July 2026: Arrives in Singapore, 46 days and 28 trains after the first departure.

He posted a map of the finished ride on TikTok. The childhood love of locomotives is real. He spent six months in 2024 as an assistant engineer at SMRT Corp. What he likes now is the quiet. On a long train, he said, you watch other people live their lives, sometimes with no signal, and you have to sit with your own thoughts.

The China-Laos Line Carried the Southern Half

From Ulan-Ude the itinerary ran to Ulaanbaatar, then China, Hong Kong, Laos, Thailand and Malaysia. Friends in Berlin, Beijing and Penang broke the 46-day solitude. The southern hinge that makes a rail finish even thinkable is new. Two pairs of high-speed trains between Kunming and Vientiane now cover 1,022km in 9.5 to 10 hours, including border checks, on a line that opened in stages from 2021 and added a second daily pair in 2025.

That still is not a single train to Singapore. Vientiane and Bangkok remain a border change for most travellers. Thailand’s Padang Besar service, train 46, takes a little over 16 hours up from the Malaysian frontier. Inside Malaysia the ETS and KTM trains are ordinary and cheap. The last scheduled passenger train across the Johor Strait is KTM’s Shuttle Tebrau, five minutes between JB Sentral and Woodlands Train Checkpoint, 13 daily trips toward Johor and 18 back into Singapore.

WHAT STILL CONNECTS ONCE YOU LEAVE SIBERIA

• Kunming to Vientiane: 1,022km, two daily pairs, about 9.5 to 10 hours including customs.
• Padang Besar to Bangkok: overnight train 46, a little over 16 hours in a second-class sleeper.
• Johor to Woodlands: Shuttle Tebrau in five minutes, 31 trips a day both ways combined.
• What is not open yet: the RTS Link into Woodlands North, still aimed at 2027, after which the shuttle is due to die.

He did not publish a train-by-train ticket list, so the Hong Kong detour may have meant extra mainline rides inside China before he dropped into Laos. The point is the same. The southern rails are getting longer. The European join is not. Anyone copying his map next summer will find a harder Narva and the same missing sleepers west of Moscow.

Fourteen Clubmates and a December Peak

This was not his first solo trip. In September 2023 he walked Grand Teton and Yellowstone. That November he climbed Mount Ollivier in New Zealand. In 2025 he backpacked Landmannalaugar and Hornstrandir in Iceland. Alone in a country where nobody knows him, he said, he talks more and walks up to strangers.

He also knows the clock. He is due to graduate in 2028 into a tighter job market, and he said trips of this length will not last. The next outing is already booked in a different register: December, with 14 others from the NUS Mountaineering Club, aiming at one of three Langtang peaks, Naya Khang, Tsorku Peak or Scout Peak, after the monsoon window that runs from mid-June to early September. They plan to move from Kathmandu to Thulo Syabru and to skip ground hit by the recent floods.

A year-round adventure habit is the bet he is placing with the years he still has on a student timetable. The 21,445km ride is the proof of method. It was cheap for the distance, slow on purpose, and dependent on a footbridge that the two states on either bank keep tightening. Copy it while the 07:00 to 19:00 window still exists, and while a Singapore visa still gets you onto the Rossiya’s cousin trains. The map will not wait for graduation.

He put the change in a single line after the last ticket.

“I’m happy with how far I’ve come. I’m no longer dreaming about things that I could do, but I’m actually doing things.”

Frequently Asked Questions

Do Singaporeans Need a Visa to Enter Russia?

Yes. Singaporeans must get a visa before travel, keep the passport valid for at least six months after the planned exit, and check whether an e-visa is accepted at the specific land post they will use. On entry you sign a migration card, keep the returned half with the passport, and register with the Russian authorities within 7 working days, a step most hotels handle and private hosts must complete.

What Is Platzkart on a Trans-Siberian Train?

Platzkart is third class: an open car of bunk rows with no compartment door and more than 50 people sharing the space. Kupe, the second class he had meant to book, puts four beds behind a lockable door at about half the price of spalny vagon, the two-bed first class. He was sold the open car by mistake in Moscow and only saw it when he boarded.

Is There a Passenger Train From Johor Into Singapore?

Yes. KTM’s Shuttle Tebrau runs the five-minute hop between JB Sentral and Woodlands Train Checkpoint, 13 times a day toward Johor and 18 times back into Singapore. Long-distance KTM trains stop at JB Sentral rather than rolling into Singapore, and the shuttle is due to give way once the RTS Link opens, a change now aimed at 2027.

What Ride Did Nicholas Chua Use as His Template?

He followed Spanish YouTuber Ramilla de Aventura, whose June 2023 Portugal-to-Singapore series covered about 18,755km and has passed 2.5 million views on a channel of about 696,000 subscribers. Chua’s own run was 2,690km longer because he started in Scotland and added detours, including Hong Kong, rather than riding a single theoretical Lagos-to-Singapore line.