A SLEEPLESS NIGHT FULL

The journey itself was FORTY FOUR (44!) hours, so I needed to sleep twice. I eventually purchased a hard seat ticket, and I had the centre seat in a block of three. I went to buy a soft sleeper train ticket and found they were sold out for a week. 'I needed to be halfway across China in a week to start a job and was pretty much bankrupt. It's three days I'll never forget and without a doubt my most horrific travelling memory.' - Geoff A tall man on a train, China To make matters worse, I had these horrible stomach pains during the trip and discovered at a hospital in Bamako that I had kidney stones. I think it says a lot for the general hygiene and aroma of the carriage that I didn't notice the petrol smell until I got off. I managed this with some success over the next two nights but had really bad headaches during the day - when we got to Bamako and I unpacked my stuff I discovered (and I can't believe I didn't notice this along the way), the petrol bottle for my camp stove had been leaking in my tent bag and I'd basically been drugging myself to sleep each night with low grade petrol. We managed to eke out about two square metres in a corridor and when fatigue really kicked in about 4am, I tried to curl up and sleep with my head resting on my tent bag.

A SLEEPLESS NIGHT FULL

The train turned up three days (yes, days) late at midnight, and an already full train was filled by about as many people again.

'I was catching the train from Tambacounda in Senegal to Bamako in Mali - a three-day trip. Here are seven of the best 'worst night's sleep' stories we've ever heard: A sleep-fuelled tale, Senegal to Mali But some nights test even the most hardened sleeper. Travellers learn to grab forty winks in some pretty taxing situations: overnight bus trips, hostel rooms of 15 snorers, humid places with no air-con.

A sleepless night