The train inaugurated in 1883 by the Belgian entrepreneur Georges Nagelmackers has become the most famous in the world. Its history and the story of its many different routes fill whole books, and even before its resuscitation by the American entrepreneur James Sherwood in 1982 it had become a byword for all that was most intriguing, romantic and mysterious about long-distance international train travel.

The original Orient Express ran between Paris and Istanbul, but new routes (and variations on the name) were developed. In its pre-war years at least, it was also associated with elegance and luxury and culinary excellence, and it is these qualities that characterise today’s private train, the Venice Simplon-Orient-Express.

Appropriately enough for a train steeped in romance, its principal routes link three of Europe’s most beguiling cities, London, Paris and Venice. The chocolate-and-cream British Pullman train departs from London Victoria and glides through Kent, the London-bound commuters waiting on station platforms looking on enviously as brunch and Bellinis are served on the way to the Channel. In France the royal-blue train with brass insignia, lined by uniformed and white-gloved attendants, is waiting to take you through the most fought-over acres of France to the capital, while a four-course dinner is served. The dinner is made unforgettable by the sumptuous surroundings of the Lalique glass- and wood-panelled dining cars as well as the quality of the food, a miracle of skill conjured up in the tiny galley kitchen.

In Paris the train uses the same station from which the first Orient Express departed on October 4 1883, Gare de l’Est. The sense of dinner-jacketed style is enhanced by the contrast with passengers milling about on the platforms, the bar car’s piano and period tunes a world away from the iPods of today’s Parisian commuters.

It is likely to be dark by the time the train weaves through the hills growing the pinot noir, chardonnay and pinot meunier grapes that produce the Champagne served on board. Passengers slumber through eastern France and northern Switzerland, usually waking somewhere east of Zürich. Raising the blind to reveal the waters of Zürichsee or the majestic peaks lining the northern shore of Walensee is part of the pleasure of overnight train travel – that sense of being somewhere so different from the landscapes and architecture of the previous evening.

The snow-capped peaks of tiny Liechtenstein are a prelude to the Austrian Alps, as a continental breakfast is delivered to your compartment. After crossing the border into Austria the train climbs towards the Arlberg Pass and summit tunnel to reach Innsbruck, though there are occasions when the Orient-Express uses the Gotthard route through Switzerland to reach northern Italy. The train weaves along the contours as a succession of stone castles and impressive church towers strain skyward among the natural pinnacles of rock. Chalets dot the slopes of the Voralberg, divided from the Tyrol by the six-mile, dead-straight Alberg Tunnel.

A pause at the Tyrolean capital of Innsbruck is an opportunity to stretch one’s legs before the train reverses to head south through the Brenner Pass, its crags periodically topped by stone fortresses controlling valleys through the Dolomites. Lunch is served as the train drops down from the summit on the border with Italy, conifer-clad slopes giving way to huddled villages surrounded by vineyards and orchards.

The architectural style of the pale stone castle and palaces forming Buonconsiglio Castle in Trento emphasises the transition from central European to Mediterranean culture. With the Adige River for company, the train makes for Verona, forever associated with doomed love and Verdi’s operas, most impressively performed in the city’s Roman amphitheatre.

Afternoon tea is served as the train crosses the fertile landscape of the Veneto, dotted with the vast agricultural complexes so perfectly realised by Palladio in the countryside around Vicenza. The last major city before journey’s end is Padua, where Galileo once taught mathematics at the university, founded in 1222. The causeway linking Venice Mestre and the island is the perfect approach to the city and its towers and domes rising above the tiled roofs. Then, when the train arrives and you walk out of Santa Lucia terminus, you find yourself on the bank of the Grand Canal.

The Venice-bound train is associated with elegance and luxury

There are also many trips on the Orient-Express to Venice that start in Paris. Occasional itineraries weave through eastern Europe; for example, on a seven-night package from Venice to London passengers spend two nights in both Krakow and Dresden before arriving in London.

New for 2013 are departures from Venice to Copenhagen and Stockholm. Once a year the train takes a route as close to the original 1883 route between Paris and Istanbul as practicable, with one night in Budapest and Bucharest and, as one of the off-train excursions, a visit to the former summer residence of the Romanian king at Sinaia in the Carpathian Mountains, where the pioneer travellers were received by King Carol I.

Highlights

After seven or eight minutes of darkness, the exit from the Arlberg Tunnel is a coup de théâtre, as the train bursts into an amphitheatre of snow-capped mountains surrounding the ski resort of St Anton. In the descent to Innsbruck the train passes the great 13th-century castle of Landeck, guarding the Inn Valley.

Booking

Orient-Express UK reservations (0845 077 2222; vsoe.com).

Time

The train operates between late March and early November on a variety of itineraries lasting from a day to six nights. Spring and autumn are particularly agreeable seasons for the most frequent itinerary between London, Paris and Venice because of more moderate temperatures and fewer visitors in La Serenissima.

Cost

The classic overnight journey from London to Venice, or vice versa, costs from £1,920 per person based on two sharing a double cabin and includes all table d’hote meals. The new seven-night package from Venice to Stockholm, including two nights at the Hotel Cipriani in Venice, two nights aboard the train, one night in Copenhagen and two nights in Stockholm at The Grand Hotel, costs from £4,860 per person, including flight from and to London. Prices for the annual journey from Paris to Istanbul start at £11,000 per person.

On board

To travel on the Orient-Express is to step back in time to the best that train travel had to offer in the 1920s. It is the quality of the décor (exquisite art deco marquetry and glass panels, and generous armchair seats in the three dining-cars), service and food that distinguishes the train.

To travel on the Orient-Express is to step back in time

Cabins with comfortable upper and lower beds are identically sized with washbasin in a cupboard, but two can be connected to give more space. To the surprise of some who have not read a full description of the train, lavatories are at the end of the corridor, and there are no showers; passengers are buying an authentic experience of period travel. The bar car with piano is the social hub of the train, and there is a small shop of tasteful souvenirs.

The food – refined French cuisine – is to Michelin-star standard, and the meals, served with silverware, crystal glass and starched napery, are the highlight for many passengers. All meals are provided, and a continental breakfast is served in the cabins.

Tips

Packing

To make the most of the experience, dress up. Most passengers make the effort to complement the setting, so pack black tie and evening dresses for dinner and smart casual during the day. Some parties dress in period fashions. Jeans are never acceptable.

What to read

The train has been made famous by novels set on it, most notably the 1934 thriller Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie, who used the train to join her husband on his archaeological digs in Iraq. Stamboul Train by Graham Greene, published in 1932, weaves a complex plot around a journey from Ostend to Istanbul.

The Paris correspondent of The Times, Henri Opper de Blowitz, was one of the invited guests on the inaugural run in 1883 and he appears as a character in a fictional account of it, Flashman and the Tiger, by George MacDonald Fraser.

For a history of the train, with particular emphasis on the restoration of the rolling stock by James Sherwood, the best book is Venice Simplon Orient-Express by Shirley Sherwood (Weidenfeld & Nicolson). Much fuller accounts of the social and political history of the train can be found in The Orient Express by Anthony Burton (David & Charles) and The Orient-Express by Jean des Cars and Jean-Paul Caracalla (Bloomsbury). James Sherwood gives his own account of the train’s revival in Orient-Express: A Personal Journey (Robson).

What to listen to

No significant music has been composed with the train as the theme, but a comparable train, the (French) Blue Train inspired Milhaud’s ballet score Le Train bleu, which was first performed by the Ballets Russes in 1924, directed by Diaghilev; the libretto was by Cocteau, the costumes by Chanel and the stage curtain was painted by Picasso.

Though Honegger applied the title Pacific 231 retrospectively to his 1923 symphonic movement, it can be reasonably inferred that he had in mind the departure of an express train since he wrote, “I have always loved locomotives passionately. For me they are living creatures…” And the music unmistakably captures the sense of an express train’s departure.

What to watch

Agatha Christie’s thriller has twice been made into a film, in 1974 with an all-star cast in one of the most successful adaptations of her work, and again in 2001. Greene’s Stamboul Train was made into a poor film in 1934 entitled Orient Express, heavily reliant on unconvincing studio sets. It was considered appropriate to feature a steam-hauled Orient Express in the 1963 film adaptation of Ian Fleming’s From Russia with Love, in which Sean Connery, as James Bond, has a fight on the train.