Australia's loooong train journeys
October 23, 2023 7:07 PM Subscribe
While not even approaching the world's longest train journey of 18,755km, Australia offers a number of journeys by train that ask us to consider the opposite of how we mostly travel - the journey is the thing, not the destination.
The Ghan, spanning the Australian mainland vertically for 2,979km and the Indian Pacific, traversing the continent horizontally over four days for 4,352km including a 478km completely straight stretch of track are the best-known journeys. There are other journeys where you can ponder the meaning of life or just avoid the soul-sucking experience that air travel has become.
As society demanded more and more speed and convenience in their travel, long-distance trains seemed to be on the verge of extinction, eclipsed by cheap and frequent air travel. Over the last decade or so though, there has been a huge increase in the popularity of these journeys as holidays in and of themselves. Packaged with all sorts of tourist activities along the way, long-distance trains have become something akin to land-bound cruise ships, providing the only viable way for many people to see the interior of this sparse continent. No longer the domain of cheap travel for the working class, train-based holiday packages are available for a month or more and can cost $35,000.
The Ghan, spanning the Australian mainland vertically for 2,979km and the Indian Pacific, traversing the continent horizontally over four days for 4,352km including a 478km completely straight stretch of track are the best-known journeys. There are other journeys where you can ponder the meaning of life or just avoid the soul-sucking experience that air travel has become.
As society demanded more and more speed and convenience in their travel, long-distance trains seemed to be on the verge of extinction, eclipsed by cheap and frequent air travel. Over the last decade or so though, there has been a huge increase in the popularity of these journeys as holidays in and of themselves. Packaged with all sorts of tourist activities along the way, long-distance trains have become something akin to land-bound cruise ships, providing the only viable way for many people to see the interior of this sparse continent. No longer the domain of cheap travel for the working class, train-based holiday packages are available for a month or more and can cost $35,000.
You can watch the entire 15 hour journey of The Ghan on SBS-on-demand (free login required).
I've watched this. There are parts of the desert where it could be on a loop. It just goes on and on and on.
An SBS account is a great deal, come for the train ride, but stay for all the foreign language content in dozens of languages.
posted by adept256 at 7:27 PM on October 23, 2023 [6 favorites]
I've watched this. There are parts of the desert where it could be on a loop. It just goes on and on and on.
An SBS account is a great deal, come for the train ride, but stay for all the foreign language content in dozens of languages.
posted by adept256 at 7:27 PM on October 23, 2023 [6 favorites]
Typical. You wait all year for a good train post and then three four of them come along at the same time...
FTFY
posted by dg at 7:49 PM on October 23, 2023 [4 favorites]
FTFY
posted by dg at 7:49 PM on October 23, 2023 [4 favorites]
Don't look now....
posted by JHarris at 9:23 PM on October 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by JHarris at 9:23 PM on October 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
I've got two overnight Australian trains lined up for next month... looking forward to it! Nothing this long, though - just melbourne->sydney and sydney->brisbane.
posted by kaibutsu at 9:28 PM on October 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by kaibutsu at 9:28 PM on October 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
A friend who lives in Brisbane once posted a number of photos from her 24 hour train journey on social media. When she got to her destination, I looked up the trip online, expecting her to have traveled most of the way across Australia. Reader, she hadn’t even left her state.
Australia is confusingly big.
posted by Kattullus at 10:17 PM on October 23, 2023 [4 favorites]
Australia is confusingly big.
posted by Kattullus at 10:17 PM on October 23, 2023 [4 favorites]
Australia is confusingly big.
A year ago, we did a trip from where we live on the Gold Coast to Cape Tribulation. We drove for four days to get there. We never left our state. I think it helps people from the US to remember that mainland Australia is of a similar size to the US lower 48 states, but with only six states and 25m people. Our state is approximately the size of Mexico with 5m people. As I mentioned in the post, train travel is really the only way for people to see the interior of Australia unless they are prepared to undertake huge amounts of car travel in very remote areas, even if you flew in to somewhere central first.
posted by dg at 11:46 PM on October 23, 2023 [6 favorites]
A year ago, we did a trip from where we live on the Gold Coast to Cape Tribulation. We drove for four days to get there. We never left our state. I think it helps people from the US to remember that mainland Australia is of a similar size to the US lower 48 states, but with only six states and 25m people. Our state is approximately the size of Mexico with 5m people. As I mentioned in the post, train travel is really the only way for people to see the interior of Australia unless they are prepared to undertake huge amounts of car travel in very remote areas, even if you flew in to somewhere central first.
posted by dg at 11:46 PM on October 23, 2023 [6 favorites]
also worth remembering that, for whatever reason, Australia never built high-speed trains. Some of these trains barely manage to go faster than a car on the highway.
posted by Merus at 1:32 AM on October 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Merus at 1:32 AM on October 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
Nothing this long, though - just melbourne->sydney and sydney->brisbane
Enjoy.
My parents lived in Australia in the early 1950s and my mother always told me I was conceived on the Sydney to Brisbane train. They moved back to the UK before I was born. I think this accounts for my love of travel.
posted by jvbthegolfer at 4:38 AM on October 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
Enjoy.
My parents lived in Australia in the early 1950s and my mother always told me I was conceived on the Sydney to Brisbane train. They moved back to the UK before I was born. I think this accounts for my love of travel.
posted by jvbthegolfer at 4:38 AM on October 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
My partner keeps wanting to take the Ghan but I don't quite see the point, since it doesn't really afford for interesting stops along the way. Paradoxically I'm more interested in the Indian Pacific precisely because the Nullarbor Plain seems so completely empty, it'd be meditative to cross it. At least for a bit, then I suspect it's just boring.
I just took the Transcantabrico, a 7 day luxury train trip across Northern Spain. It's only 600km of train, you go very slowly and most days are filled with tourist excursions by bus. It's super luxury and very nice hospitality, we really had a good time. I just wrote my tourist blog post about it, you can also watch this Mighty Trains episode of the trip. (They have an episode on The Ghan too.)
I've also taken the Maharajah's Express from Delhi to Mumbai, another week-long luxury tourist trip. That was fantastic and a great way to see a lot of tourist sites in that part of India, mostly Rajasthan.
posted by Nelson at 7:18 AM on October 24, 2023
I just took the Transcantabrico, a 7 day luxury train trip across Northern Spain. It's only 600km of train, you go very slowly and most days are filled with tourist excursions by bus. It's super luxury and very nice hospitality, we really had a good time. I just wrote my tourist blog post about it, you can also watch this Mighty Trains episode of the trip. (They have an episode on The Ghan too.)
I've also taken the Maharajah's Express from Delhi to Mumbai, another week-long luxury tourist trip. That was fantastic and a great way to see a lot of tourist sites in that part of India, mostly Rajasthan.
posted by Nelson at 7:18 AM on October 24, 2023
Paradoxically I'm more interested in the Indian Pacific precisely because the Nullarbor Plain seems so completely empty, it'd be meditative to cross it. At least for a bit, then I suspect it's just boring.
I've driven across the Nullarbor three times and it was interesting each time. The little things become fascinating because there's so few of them.
posted by The Notorious SRD at 8:07 AM on October 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
I've driven across the Nullarbor three times and it was interesting each time. The little things become fascinating because there's so few of them.
posted by The Notorious SRD at 8:07 AM on October 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
We had high hopes of taking the India Pacific in 2021 while we were in WA, but then COVID got out of control and all the states were shutting their borders. It's one of the top trips on my list.
posted by rednikki at 8:27 AM on October 24, 2023
posted by rednikki at 8:27 AM on October 24, 2023
Nothing this long, though - just melbourne->sydney and sydney->brisbane
It's great that you can take a train from Sydney all the way to Brisbane now! Many a time I've caught that train, which involved alighting at Murwillimbah at the Queensland border to instead board a coach to drive to Brisbane due to different gauge railways. Progress!
posted by goo at 12:39 AM on October 25, 2023
It's great that you can take a train from Sydney all the way to Brisbane now! Many a time I've caught that train, which involved alighting at Murwillimbah at the Queensland border to instead board a coach to drive to Brisbane due to different gauge railways. Progress!
posted by goo at 12:39 AM on October 25, 2023
Oh, you're entirely correct - there's a switch to a coach in the middle of nowhere...
posted by kaibutsu at 4:17 AM on October 25, 2023
posted by kaibutsu at 4:17 AM on October 25, 2023
Many a time I've caught that train, which involved alighting at Murwillimbah at the Queensland border to instead board a coach to drive to Brisbane due to different gauge railways.
There is a train service that operates between Sydney and Brisbane and has been for a long time - I traveled on it from Sydney to Brisbane accompanied by all our worldly possessions when we first moved to Australia from New Zealand in 1977. There is a single NSW-gauge line that runs from Murwillumbah to Brisbane, consisting of a section of track that terminates at Roma Street Station in the Brisbane CBD. From Acacia Ridge to Roma Street, it runs along the Qld-gauge line and uses one of those track's rails, with an extra rail outside the narrow gauge line.
posted by dg at 4:45 PM on October 25, 2023
There is a train service that operates between Sydney and Brisbane and has been for a long time - I traveled on it from Sydney to Brisbane accompanied by all our worldly possessions when we first moved to Australia from New Zealand in 1977. There is a single NSW-gauge line that runs from Murwillumbah to Brisbane, consisting of a section of track that terminates at Roma Street Station in the Brisbane CBD. From Acacia Ridge to Roma Street, it runs along the Qld-gauge line and uses one of those track's rails, with an extra rail outside the narrow gauge line.
posted by dg at 4:45 PM on October 25, 2023
An SBS account is a great deal, come for the train ride, but stay for all the foreign language content in dozens of languages.
posted by adept256
SBS On Demand is a treasure chest, stuffed full of good films, shows, and docos.
Do have to put up with some ads, and don't expect 4K image quality. But well worth it.
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posted by Pouteria at 7:08 AM on October 26, 2023
posted by adept256
SBS On Demand is a treasure chest, stuffed full of good films, shows, and docos.
Do have to put up with some ads, and don't expect 4K image quality. But well worth it.
Recently Added TV Shows
TV Shows Leaving Soon
Recently Added Movies
Movies Leaving Soon
posted by Pouteria at 7:08 AM on October 26, 2023
There is a single NSW-gauge line that runs from Murwillumbah to Brisbane, consisting of a section of track that terminates at Roma Street Station in the Brisbane CBD.
Why don't they use this for all the Sydney - Brisbane trains? Instead of adding several hours to an already interminably long trip!
posted by goo at 3:14 PM on October 28, 2023
Why don't they use this for all the Sydney - Brisbane trains? Instead of adding several hours to an already interminably long trip!
posted by goo at 3:14 PM on October 28, 2023
Why don't they use this for all the Sydney - Brisbane trains?
I thought they did. It was news to me that there is a Sydney-Brisbane passenger service terminating at Murwillumbah, although I think the old MotoRail (take your car on the train!) used to terminate there.
posted by dg at 4:47 PM on October 29, 2023
I thought they did. It was news to me that there is a Sydney-Brisbane passenger service terminating at Murwillumbah, although I think the old MotoRail (take your car on the train!) used to terminate there.
posted by dg at 4:47 PM on October 29, 2023
Nope, I got that train probably 20 times over 25 years and it's news to me that you could go direct before recent times! Usually I was going further than Sydney (Canberra or Melbourne, Dubbo a couple of times). The coach from Roma Street to Murwillimbah was just painful on top of that.
Now it looks like they want you to go to Casino for an additional four hour coach trip! (Scroll down to 'journey details'). I think Murwillimbah was better than Casino. They must only be able to have one train on the direct track at a time, or something.
posted by goo at 1:40 PM on October 30, 2023
Now it looks like they want you to go to Casino for an additional four hour coach trip! (Scroll down to 'journey details'). I think Murwillimbah was better than Casino. They must only be able to have one train on the direct track at a time, or something.
posted by goo at 1:40 PM on October 30, 2023
Oh, that's just sneaky! If you're not catching the train until Casino, you can't really call that a Brisbane-Sydney train at all. No doubt it's related to track capacity, because the NSW-gauge line takes up space on perhaps the sector of SE Qld train infrastructure with the least spare capacity.
posted by dg at 6:29 PM on October 30, 2023
posted by dg at 6:29 PM on October 30, 2023
It's less than 12 hours from Sydney to Casino so they can turn it around and run it back again for a daily service using one train.
For the daily service from Sydney to Brisbane they need two trains because it takes more than 12 hours.
Both of these services are run by NSW so there's probably interstate politics involved?
posted by onya at 7:02 PM on October 30, 2023
For the daily service from Sydney to Brisbane they need two trains because it takes more than 12 hours.
Both of these services are run by NSW so there's probably interstate politics involved?
posted by onya at 7:02 PM on October 30, 2023
https://transportnsw.info/regional/book-sydney-to-brisbane-by-train
so yeah just to be clear there's 2 services, only one of which involves a bus
posted by onya at 7:33 PM on October 30, 2023
so yeah just to be clear there's 2 services, only one of which involves a bus
posted by onya at 7:33 PM on October 30, 2023
> It's less than 12 hours from Sydney to Casino so they can turn it around and run it back again for a daily service using one train.
Yer that makes sense! I do think it has stopped being a Sydney-Brisbane service at that point though, as dg notes.
posted by goo at 2:49 AM on November 4, 2023
Yer that makes sense! I do think it has stopped being a Sydney-Brisbane service at that point though, as dg notes.
posted by goo at 2:49 AM on November 4, 2023
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