Trains, trains, trains

We caught a train from Nha Trang to Ho Chi Minh city. But not just any train, this was the recently inaugaurated 5 Star Express. This train was nearly brand new, having started in Decenber 2006 which is very new for train rolling stock. Marie pointed out that the carriages may have been refurbished rather than new rolling stock, but I am not quite enough of a trainspotter to be able to pick the difference. They might just have been dirty...
My trainspotter contribution is that the Vietnamese break up their ballast (the rocks under the railway sleepers and track) by hand with picks, whereas in western countries this is done by machine. Also, the train was motoring along - faster than long distance trains in NZ- so either the Vietnamese track network is in exceptional shape, or they do not have the same level of safety controls (and the resultant speed restrictions) as in NZ. For my sake, I hope it was the former.

I counted 25 passengers spread throughout the eight carriages (with varying prices and standards of seating), and 24 visible service staff. Marie commented that for the staff it was like her summer job working on the NZ interislander ferry: very few passengers, so you can sit around or sleep for most of the time.

We were in the lowest level of seating, which was still very comfortable and double decker. There were another couple of levels of nicer seating, and the flashest seats were sold by the compartment, where you pay 2.4 million dong for a compartment which seats up to four people in very plush comfort. That sounds like a lot of moolah, but it is equivalent to USD 150. I reckon if you were travelling in a quartet and making your trip in a higher level of comfort than our current trip, then USD 150 for four people for a eight hour train ride is not too bad.
I managed to get the following photos of the the lower grade seating, but by the time I went back to the compartment area they realised that riff raff were able to enter so they had locked the door.






To give you an idea of the entertainment options on this train: there was a dining car, and a separate 'multi purpose' carriage. I saw mention of a massage train in some of the promotional material, but I couldn't find this particular carriage. The multipurpose carriage operated as a disco from Fridays through Sundays, and played movies the rest of the week. Disco on a train!


When we went into the dining car the six staff promptly got up from where they had been sitting, and tried to look like they were doing something- it only takes one person to pour our beers (into plastic cups, haha) and a second person to fetch a rather tasty grilled mackeral, so this is the definition of 'make work'.