The Train to Montreal

A couple weeks ago I took a few days away from the NYC area. I decided to try Amtrak for the first time--tickets to Montreal cost about the same a driving (possibly a little less with gas prices), and I wouldn't have to pay for parking. The only downside to taking the train is that it takes almost twice as long as driving--the schedule estimates 11 hours, whereas driving would be about six.

The bright side of taking the train to Montreal is the scenery. On the way out of New York City, there's a great view of the Palisades across the Hudson River. Further along the tracks, the train slowly snakes along the shore of Lake Champlain. It's beautiful, but painfully slow.

For some reason, on the way out of the U.S. we were stopped by U.S. customs for a half hour before our stop at Canadian customs. Our train still managed to be close to on time. On the way back, U.S. customs took two hours. Add to that some unscheduled stops for a fax and responding to said fax, plus signal problems, and we were two and a half hours late arriving at Penn Station (I got back to my apartment just after midnight).

Fortunately, I managed to get a decent amount of reading done on the train. I also met a few friendly passengers to talk with in both directions. I just wish I could sleep on any form of transportation (next time I should take some nighttime medicine to knock me out).

If there was ever an argument for a high speed rail line in the U.S., I found it. There is no reason a train should travel at less than 30 miles per hour for extended stretches when there is no other train traffic on the tracks. One curious note about Amtrak is that while the NYC-Montreal train takes about 11 hours to travel about 360 miles, it only takes 12 1/2 hours to travel to Toronto, which is almost 600 miles. Sounds like Amtrak needs a more direct route to Montreal.

Trains vs. Planes

China's two largest airlines claim that they are losing business because of the emergence of the high-speed rail network. It seems that short flights are being replaced by the train service because it doesn't take any longer to travel by train in such instances. This argument makes a lot of sense when considering that airports in China are in the outskirts of cities and require more time to check in and go through security. The trains are usually more centrally located and don't require as much time at security checks. Also, the trains cost less than plane tickets.

In contrast, the US train network still sucks. We have one high-speed rail line between Boston and Washington, D.C. And it's not a cheap ride. We've been promised more high-speed rail lines across the nation, but progress is painfully slow. Even the other train lines aren't worth using. Back in July, I wanted to take the train from northern New Jersey to Pittsburgh (or towns nearby). The train ride would have taken almost twice as long and cost three times as much as driving. It would have cost about the same to fly to Pittsburgh.

If the US ever builds a decent high-speed rail network, we may finally stop hearing about United's horrible customer service because they'll go out of business instead of filing for bankruptcy again.

Transit Breakdown

[Part of the Thailand adventure]
Trains are an interesting part of the travel adventure in Thailand. During our first few days, Jia and I took a short ride north of Bangkok to the ancient capital of Ayutthaya. On the way there, the train was 40 minutes late. We soon discovered on that trip that our seats were not reserved, but rather a bit of luck. Anyone travelling further along the train line was given a reserved seat. So, if you were unlucky enough to pick the wrong seat at the Bangkok station, you had to stand the hour and a half to Ayutthaya. We were, of course, not lucky on that journey.

Our next rail adventure was far northward to Chiang Mai on an overnight sleeper. We paid a little extra to get air conditioning rather than a fan. We regretted it a bit as we froze through the night. Jia had it better than I did as she had the lower bunk in which no light came through. Our car's lights beamed on through the journey and into my eyes. That, combined with the freezing air and the car door next to feet and continuously opened and closed every 15 minutes, didn't make for a restful ride. It also didn't help that I couldn't stretch my legs out fully (and I'm only 5'9").

It was on the trip back to Bangkok that we encountered our more serious problems. We waited for our 5:55 pm sleeper train. We figured it was just late. At 6:30 I told Jia to ask someone about the train as another was expected to arrive at this time to head for the same station. I was a little shocked and angry when she came back and said our train was cancelled.

We went over to the ticket office to make sure of the situation. "The train fell off the track," the man in the window said. I was confused, I didn't want to believe it. "So, what do we do?" I asked.
We were told we could either catch a late bus or the last train for Bangkok. The only problem was, there were no sleepers. "But the seats recline a lot," we were assured.

We should've stayed in Chiang Mai. We waited another three and a half hours for the train. We sat across the street at a food vendor selling kai yang (grilled chicken) just outside the 7-11 where we bought a couple beers in the hopes of sleeping through the night. On the train we struggled to sleep with seats that barely reclined.

We arrived in Bangkok late in the morning and hopped in a tuk-tuk to the eastern bus station and our more comfortable bus that would take us to the ferry to Ko Samet.