Check out The Kunming Train Syndrome under
Glimpses of the Road, back on
Randy's Travel Page.
Many of the train journeys you take will be long -- all day or overnight. For longer journeys, you have to think seriously about how you will eat, drink, and sleep, and about the possible discomforts of the various classes of passage. Somewhere along the line you need to collect a few of your own horror stories about nights spent standing in the toilet, or sleeping in the luggage rack, but a few of these go a long way.
Classes
There are so many different trains and classes in various countries that it is difficult to know what will be the most reasonable; second class in one country may be like first class in another. If trains are overcrowded, the only way to hope for any breathing room, or the opportunity to get up and move around, is to travel in one of the higher classes: first, special second, second sleeper, air-con or such. I have spent many reasonably comfortable nights sitting up in ordinary second class, but in some countries, only the very intrepid and adventurous would intentionally attempt such a feat.
I must add that you will also have the pleasure of a number of journeys on comfortable and uncrowded trains; cherish them where you can. You may find uncrowded trains in uncrowded countries, or where the bus service is cheaper, or much faster for the same price; this may be your chance to enjoy a quiet train journey, sometimes through more interesting scenery.
Tickets
One problem with trains is that it is often a hassle to get tickets. Sometimes you have to queue up days ahead of time. In China and India -- the countries where you will almost exclusively be using trains -- they are usually overcrowded and booked up well in advance. In China you shouldn't stop in any city that you don't plan to visit for at least three or four days. It will take you that long to get a ticket out, and you could spend numerous hours on several days queuing up to get anything below first class. There can be some very serious crushes on ticket windows, which do not involve anything remotely resembling a queue. You can see why I sometimes give up and head for the bus station. Sometimes you can have agents, or the tourist office, buy tickets for you.
Sleepers
A day's journey spent in the friendly squalor of ordinary second or third class can be a great experience, but on really long overnight journeys, you may want to consider the extra cost of a sleeping berth. There may be several classes of sleepers, and the cheapest could be much better than a long night or two in a very crowded seating car. Sleepers are virtually always reserved.
Given a choice, the best sleeper is the top bunk, or the middle of three. This gets you up away from the hubbub of people coming and going, and the bottom bunks (including yours!) are used for group get-togethers until all hours of the night. You also have the option of escaping to your bunk during the daytime. Smoke rises, which is why the middle bunk is better than the top one.
Regular Seating
Second or third class is generally open seating on bench seats which may or may not be padded. The cheapest tickets are non-reserved, and these will be on the most crowded cars. Sometimes you have to fight just to get on the train, and forget about finding a seat. For longer train journeys in first and second class, you can usually get a reserved seat. You will still see people pushing to get on, partly out of habit, and partly to get their bags into the luggage racks. On second class, there may be many (many) people with unreserved tickets standing in the aisles -- and everywhere else.
See Extraordinary Journey on the Ordinary Train
on Randy's Travel Articles Page.
Check out The Kunming Train Syndrome under
Glimpses of the Road, back on
Randy's Travel Page.
See Trains of Thought in Ecuador
on Randy's Travel Articles Page.
Train Food
Many long-distance trains boast a dining car, or cheaper meals delivered to your seat, or both. Sometimes the dining car is reserved for the higher classes. The dining car may be booked up as soon as you get on; ask when buying your ticket if you can reserve meals ahead of time. There is almost always some way for the ordinary people to get cheap food, although many of them bring huge amounts of it with them. In many places, vendors swarm the train at each stop, selling various delicacies and greasy leftovers. As always, bring a minimal amount of food and water to hold you for the entire journey. If your car is extremely crowded, or if you have a non-reserved seat that you don't want to lose, it may be impossible to get to any food on the way!
This is a small van or truck that operates as a bus and as you can see, they are everywhere, by various names. Often it is a small pickup truck with two rows of covered benches in the back. In the city there will be local ones that operate just like the local buses, and there may be others that run as inter-city second-class buses. They may or may not be cheaper, but they are usually much more plentiful. They are always run by private enterprise, not the government, and very seldom do they issue tickets. They are very often incredibly crowded; sometimes you wish you'd brought your own air. There will be at least one person who takes money and is responsible for hustling as many people as possible into the truck. At a station or on a city street, they will call out their destinations, bang on the side of the truck, and approach people on the street. Often the truck will rock back and forth, pretending that it is just about to leave, for ten or twenty minutes!
In some places you will use mini-buses constantly despite their crowding, overcharging, and outrageous driving, because they are more frequent and cover more areas than buses. In other countries, you will rely on buses for long-distance transport and perhaps use the minis in town. In Sri Lanka I prefer the ordinary government buses although they are slower than the mini-buses, because they are cheaper, more comfortable, often half-empty, run frequently, and are operated honestly.
This is a taxi, car, or van which operates as a five or six-passenger bus, with a fixed route. They may operate as local city transportation or on longer inter-city routes. They never go until full, unless you want to share the cost of empty seats to leave sooner. They will be more expensive than second-class or local buses, but much faster and often more convenient. The fare may be competitive with first-class buses on longer routes.
Each route will usually have its own boarding location, or there may be taxi companies with their own stations. In cities like Mexico City and Amman, local share taxis (collectivos and servees) are much more convenient (and comfortable) than city buses; you just have to learn the routes. In Cyprus they have practically replaced the inter-city bus system, and in several other countries they are the better alternative.
If you find yourself with a group of four to six people, you may want to ask about hiring a taxi for a long ride, even where share taxis are not obvious. They are popular on runs between Thailand and Malaysia, partly because the laborious border crossing is much faster than on a large bus. Gasoline is the responsibility of the driver. On general principle, do not pay until the journey is complete, especially if the driver asks for gas money before you even leave.
Trucks are a regular (or irregular) form of transportation in many areas of the Third World. Truck riding is often associated with hitch-hiking, which is discussed below. But in some rural areas, flagging down passing trucks is the most common mode of public transport, and a revenue source for the truckers. Or a regular service may bring truckloads of villagers into market and back home again, and it could be the only way of reaching some towns. You just find out when and where the truck leaves, or fall in with a group of locals beside the road, and follow them into whatever they manage to flag down.
Check out Just Another Day in Paradise under
Glimpses of the Road, back on
Randy's Travel Page.
In other sparsely-populated areas with few or no long-distance buses, you may be able to go down to the local truck yard and arrange passage for a fee. You might be lucky and catch a truck as it pulls out, but you could also go down the night before and try to find someone going to your destination. The drivers often sleep in the trucks, or in a bunkhouse nearby. This is the best way to assure a seat up front.
[Continued on next page...]
Randy's Travel Page
.....
Transport Table of Contents
...........
Next Page