My Last Long Distance Trip On A Train From Isaan To The Capital...

[canarysun]

Ofcourse some of our "Thai Visa Viewers " are absolute Snobs ( with your noses pointing northwards) and probably the type that drink a coffee in Starbucks....... but lets be serious for a moment...I love to travel 3rd class on the train and believe me viewers you really do meet some great characters!

Canary Sun ( your lovable T.V friend....) x

[soihok]

Depends if you have the time to be travelling by train.

I also like to travel by train, just don't have the time to do it.

Great bargain though. Perhaps when I eventually give up the day job and have all the time in the world I'll be on the trains.

What I need is a Tardis

[ubonjoe]

You seem to have had bad luck with trains. I have had some late but never had a case of the locomotive breaking down much less 2 in all my years of taking the train to Bangkok from here in Ubon.

The longest was a day time train after the floods in 2011 when we ended up in Chachoengsao before going into Bangkok. The train left the normal route shortly after the Kaeng Khoi Station in Saraburi (GPS 14.577851, 100.985398 from Google maps). The first clue it was not the normal route was when we went through a tunnel (yea big surprise). It was about 4 hours late when we finally got into Bangkok.

My most recent was my first trip on the "special express" to Bangkok and back. Air conditioned with hostess that serve free food and drink. Only about an 8 hour trip instead of 12 or more.

[JLCrab]

I used to regularly travel the SRT from Khon kaen to Nong Khai for visa/90 day report reasons. One day I was there for the 9 AM train but it started to leave the station at 8:55 AM. I ran to catch it and as i was buying my ticket on-board said that I never knew a SRT train to be early. The guy said: It isn't early. This is the 6 AM train 2 hours and 55 minutes late.

[lostinisaan]

Ofcourse some of our "Thai Visa Viewers " are absolute Snobs ( with your noses pointing northwards) and probably the type that drink a coffee in Starbucks....... but lets be serious for a moment...I love to travel 3rd class on the train and believe me viewers you really do meet some great characters!

Canary Sun ( your lovable T.V friend....) x

Watch out for a guy, who's traveling with a bunch of canaries on his shoulders, who constantly repeat "Jay Dee Pee Baa" sitting in a third class wagon of a train pulled by a dying locomotive, seems to be adventurous.

Viewers, watch out.

[lostinisaan]

You seem to have had bad luck with trains. I have had some late but never had a case of the locomotive breaking down much less 2 in all my years of taking the train to Bangkok from here in Ubon.

The longest was a day time train after the floods in 2011 when we ended up in Chachoengsao before going into Bangkok. The train left the normal route shortly after the Kaeng Khoi Station in Saraburi (GPS 14.577851, 100.985398 from Google maps). The first clue it was not the normal route was when we went through a tunnel (yea big surprise). It was about 4 hours late when we finally got into Bangkok.

My most recent was my first trip on the "special express" to Bangkok and back. Air conditioned with hostess that serve free food and drink. Only about an 8 hour trip instead of 12 or more.

I took that train several times from Ubon to Sisaket and it's like a dream. All made in South Korea, first class service.

The same happened to me a few years ago in the rainy season, when the train suddenly drove backwards in Korat, then through a sort of a jungle, sometimes doing only 10 km/h.

It was a "rapid train' but turned out that it was more a rabbit one. From Sisaket to Bangkok only 16.5 hours. Only happy faces on that train.