Trainsquatting! Meet the 17-year-old who LIVES on trains, using an £8,500-a-year season ticket to hop from one service to another
- Lasse Stolley spends £8,500 a year to ride around Germany on trains
- He showers in leisure centres, sleeps on night trains and carries just a backpack
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He’s taken trainspotting to another level.
Meet Lasse Stolley – a 17-year-old who lives on trains using a 10,000-euro- (£8,500/$10,670) a-year season ticket to hop from one service to another.
This trainsquatter travels 600 miles a day throughout Germany aboard Deutsche Bahn (DB) trains using the Bahncard 100 – an unlimited rail pass that even allows him to ride first class.
He sleeps on overnight ICE trains, has breakfast in DB lounges, and showers in public swimming pools and leisure centres. And it’s all completely legal.
Lasse decided to leave his hometown in Fockbek, Schleswig-Holstein, when he was just 16 years old to embark on the unusual adventure.
Lasse Stolley, 17, left his hometown in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, to travel across the country on trains – all year round. He sleeps on overnight trains and showers in public swimming pools
Lasse travels aboard Deutsche Bahn trains (above) using the Bahncard100 – an unlimited rail pass that even allows him to ride first class
What do his parents think of it? ‘It took a lot of convincing’ before they finally agreed and helped him clear out his childhood room, he said.
The self-employed coder has no permanent address and loves life on the railways. He regularly posts updates to his blog, Life on the Train.
During the day, he sits at a table and works around commuters and general passengers. In the evening he sets up a small bed across the train seats, all while travelling from one end of the country to another.
In an interview with Business Insider, he said: ‘I have a lot of freedom and can decide every day where I want to go, whether it’s to the Alps, to a big city or the sea. I’m completely flexible.’
However, he’s had to adapt to a minimalist lifestyle while moving around. He carries all of his possessions with him in a 36-litre backpack and washes his clothes in the DB lounge sinks.
Lasse says he enjoys the ‘freedom’ the unusual lifestyle gives him. He’s pictured here in Emsland, at a test facility for Transrapid trains
Lasse carries all of his possessions with him in a 36-litre backpack and washes his clothes in the DB lounge sinks. He’s pictured above in Wernigerode, Germany
Lasse makes the most out of this limited space, packing four T-shirts, two pairs of pants, a neck pillow, and a travel blanket. But the most important items, he said, are his laptop and noise-cancelling headphones.
Lasse plans his journey through an app to make sure he can track his overnight train and have somewhere to sleep for the night.
He is hoping his train expertise might eventually lead to a job.
‘My wish would be to give feedback to the transport companies, for example, Deutsche Bahn or the train manufacturers, and get paid for it,’ he said.
There haven’t been any firm job offers just yet, but Lasse is still hopeful. ‘Let’s see,’ he said.
To follow Lasse on Instagram visit www.instagram.com/lassestolley and visit his website here – lassestolley.com. and visit his website here – lassestolley.com.
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