On the right track for an amazing journey

Nov 5 2008 by Peter Elson, Liverpool Daily Post

Eric Wise went from being desk-bound to Moscow-bound, after switching his radio career for a job guiding rail tours. Peter Elson climbs aboard to hear more

IN THE unlikely event Eric Wise were ever to doubt his wisdom in starting a second career as an international railway tour guide, he only needs to recall one glowing moment.

“Our train was pulling into Moscow Beloruska station,” remembers Eric, a smile flickering over his face.

“I leaned out of the window and there was a beautiful young woman standing on the deserted platform ahead. She held up a folder which she opened out to show two words – ERIC WISE.”

Surely such incidents should thaw out any potential new Cold War engulfing us and we should send politicians by rail forthwith to Beloruska station.

The golden moment occurred as Eric has swapped his desk as a BBC Radio Merseyside manager to join a specialist rail holiday company guiding groups travelling the world.

The company he joined, Great Rail Journeys, was started decades ago by two railwaymen in a spare bedroom in York.

It proved so successful that the pair took redundancy and devoted themselves to it full-time.

Now it has grown to handling 11,600 departures a year with 130 itineraries covering the world's railways, with durations from five days in Europe to three weeks in New Zealand.

Eric, from Formby, says: “I was aware of Great Rail Journeys when it was part of British Railways. I’d thought that I’d love to get involved in some way with a company like that, as I'm interested in travel and transport and tourism.

“After I took redundancy from the BBC, a friend suggested applying and I went along to one of the company's assessment sessions in York.

“They threw various scenarios for us to react to. I felt that the skills needed to manage a news gathering organisation were remarkably similar to those tour guiding.

“You’re always juggling several balls or doing some kind of balancing act. You have got to keep everyone happy and have a keen sense of timing.

“While working the BBC news schedules you have to prioritise, and that also applies to dealing with train schedules.”

Eric, 57, passed the interview and joined the company’s other 150 tour managers.

“This is not like your average tour representatives’ job. You’re not selling excursions round the bay.

“It helps to have done other things in life so you can bring in experience from elsewhere.”

The guides come from a variety of professions – many are retired and look on this as a bonus career. They range from former teachers, policemen, diplomatic corps members, a Michelin chef and even a peer of the realm. Usually they try and meet a couple of times a year to share experiences and chew the fat.

Besides organisational skills and being able to improvise on your feet (often on a moving train), tact and diplomacy are called for.

“You get a mix of people travelling, with different expectations. But we’ve got to make sure they realise this is an adventure and travel experience – not the Orient Express,” says David.

“I remember one British train driver who had a few problems, but I thought, I'll win him over.

“So I got him a seat behind the German Railways’ driver on our four-hour run from Munich to Cologne. After that, he was sweetness and light for the rest of the trip.

“The Russian sleeping car trains are great, but there was once one lady who we couldn't get out of bed on arrival at Moscow.

“There was a danger we’d miss our connection and we had 15 nail-biting minutes while we raised her and she got ready.

“In spite of such behaviour potentially spoiling the trip for the others, you can’t give someone like that (who’s a paying client) a good telling off. It's crucial to handle it in a way acceptable to everyone.”

His languages skills, he modestly explains, are “sort of railway and restaurant French and German”.

But he adds: “It’s more important to keep cool in a crisis, as that's when the group really looks to you for leadership.”

Eric was born in Rawtenstall, Lancs, coincidentally now the terminus of the preserved East Lancashire Railway.

While reading geography at Durham University, he became involved with the fledgling BBC Radio Durham, in 1972.

“I flirted with teaching, but had been captivated by the excitement of the media and got a BBC staff job, aged 22, in Liverpool for Radio Merseyside,” he says. “I was change manager for the station's move into Paradise Street and ended up as assistant editor.”

Leaving in March, 2007, he joined Great Rail Journeys earlier this year, although he still does project work with the BBC.

“This was an opportunity to see the world, having already visited 47 countries under my own steam. I’ve travelled by train in most of them, including the Fiji sugarbeet railway. So far, I've guided six tours this year, totalling 75 days.”

Such globe-trotting needs an understanding wife and his spouse, Eunice, deputy chairman of Liverpool magistrates bench, takes it in her stride.

Her tolerance is needed as, for five days immediately before Christmas, Eric will take a tour to Lindau, Bonn and the Rhine valley.

“Although you're travelling to interesting and exotic places, it's not a holiday, but I don't lose sleep when travelling.

“You're there to make sure things run smoothly and everyone else has a good time.

“I never drink, except for one glass on the last leg by Eurostar into St Pancras.

“What’s weird is that, after all the trials and tribulations of travelling to these amazing places, you suddenly find yourself on Euston Road, in London, standing with a suitcase of dirty washing and everything deflates.”

Yet his faith in railways remains undiminished, especially after a horrendously complex flight home from St Petersburg which took over five hours, via Copenhagen.

“The railways are absolutely fabulous in Germany and Switzerland. Everything promised is going to happen.

“Standards gradually lower as you go farther east or west from there – sadly, that includes Britain,” he says.

“The benefits in taking these sorts of guided holidays are avoiding airports and not having to drive. On board a train you can wander about, meet people and have a meal.

“Intriguing things happen on trains, like passengers getting on and off the Stockholm to Kiruna sleeper with their cats and dogs.

“Or travelling through Belorussia between Poland and Russia, which seems stuck in a Communist past, with coldly polite border police dressed in Ruritanian uniforms.

“The Russians are very paranoid, protect their borders and feel very misunderstood, angry at their former friends in the Eastern Bloc countries breaking away.

“Yet, on a personal level, they are very friendly. On a bus in Russia, people pass their fares from the back to the driver, nobody steals the roubles. I feel a lot safe on the Moscow Metro than the New York subway.”

Next year, he hopes to take tours to the US and to Berlin, which he visited 20 years ago when it was a divided city between West and East Germany.

“I'm so lucky to have different trips each time. You realise how much co-operation there is in making public transport work.

“Luggage going astray is a potential nightmare, but incredibly, unlike Britain, there are still porters in places like Brussels and Cologne who swarm around and move it for you.”

peter.elson