Colourful carriages and dreamy Elbe views: On board the European Sleeper from Brussels to Prague

Standing on the platform at Brussels-Midi station, it’s hard not to smile as the European Sleeper rolls in.

The night train is composed of 15 old carriages rented by a start-up of the same name, one of a few new private operators aiming to fashion Europe’s rail renaissance.

This will be its first journey to Prague - extending a line that has been taking travellers to Berlin via Amsterdam and back since May 2023.

It’s not with a trainspotter’s flashes of recognition that I’m greeting the rolling stock, but a childlike swell of joy at their jumbledness. Radish purple, fluted steel, yellow and blue coaches, all threaded together from different countries and decades.

The European Sleeper is a solid embodiment of its own mission: a more connected continent, in which the future of sustainable travel resembles the past. Can it really revive the golden age of rail travel? I step on board to find out.

Cards on the table, I was already a sleeper train fan when I boarded the 7.22pm service from Brussels on Monday. A previous trip on the UK’s Caledonian Sleeper convinced me that it’s an efficient and elegant way to travel as well as a climate considerate one.

Cue the obligatory expectation management that they don’t all have the old-world glamour of the Orient Express. And there’s no point pretending you get a perfect night’s sleep either. We all have our idiosyncrasies, and there’s some juddery points along the track that would test even the deepest dreamers.

My bed for the night is in a five-person couchette on a former Deutsche Bahn carriage from the 90s. Luckily I’m only sharing with one other person, a lovely Dutch woman, so we have the benefits of companionable chats while retaining some personal space.

I take the liberty of upgrading