This is the longest night train trip we experienced in Europe.

Most of the others leave around 23:00 or 24:00 and arrive at 06:00 or 07:00 so even if you get to sleep the entire journey it is short.

The Milano Barcelona night train leaves Milano Centrale at 19:40 and is scheduled to arrive at Barcelona Franca at 09:43 the following day.

Obviously this travels from Italy to Spain via France.

The train staff require passengers passports on departure and the passports are returned the following morning before arrival.

As it turned out arrival in Barcelona was over 2 hours late and we did not arrive at Barcelona until nearly midday.

The night trains to and from Barcelona terminate and leave from Franca in Bacelona.

The first class cabins were larger than the DB night train cabins but not a roomy as the night train cabins on the train from München to Wein or the SR night train from Stockholm.

According to a book in the cabin on this night train, or Trent Hotel as it is labelled, there are 2 different first class cabins available. There is the cabin of the type we had, and then there is apparently a Grande First Class cabin which has a self contained toilet and shower. The first class sleeping cabins we had only have a small hand basin in the cabin and 1 toilet and the end of each carriage.

We decided to try out the first class dining car. Apparently Grande class includes a meal in the dining car and all first class passengers get a ticket for breakfast in the dining car the next morning.

On sitting down in the dining car that evening we were presented with a menu that had around six options for each course. When it came time to order it turned out that there were actually only 2 or 3 of each of these options available. The meal was ok but definitely nothing to write home about at all.

At the end of the meal we got sick of waiting for the waiters attention to obtain the check so we went to the bar carriage which was the next carriage. The waiter from the dining car would have been there in the dining car with the check within 50 seconds or so!

Included breakfast in the morning comprised of 1 piece of toast each, one grape, a slice of orange that tasted "off", a slice of kiwi fruit, 2 cup cakes and 1 glass of juice. There was brewed coffee and green tea but they claim they had run out of tea.

The compulsory reservations for this trip cost 220 Euro @ 110 Euro per person.

If we ever wanted to do this trip again we would be looking to take a faster day train service even if it cost extra.