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Thailand railways

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turbo mick

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Hi
iam off to thailand for me hols in november has any one travelled on the train in thailand ,iam off to koh samui by 1st class sleeper from bangkok to shurintani takes about 12hrs should be a laugh
 
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LondonBVE

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Never travel on the Thailand Railways before but if you fall in love with the current British Railway then you really see a great difference. Since most Asia countries are more laid back, the usage of Railway is low means less frequency of trains and less travel on railways means lesser profit to the railway company so don't expect something nice but maybe First Class may satisfied you. I myself also do not like the railways in Malaysia not to mention Thailand, well I think I am too used to comfort in Singapore Transport. A little tip that our teacher taught us if we go to Thailand, don't be so kind or kindness will kill you. ;)
 

Nigel Gresley

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Hi
iam off to thailand for me hols in november has any one travelled on the train in thailand ,iam off to koh samui by 1st class sleeper from bangkok to shurintani takes about 12hrs should be a laugh

I would be interested to hear about your experience.

I enjoyed the reasonable comfort of the first class on the journey between Bankok and Chang Mai. The 800 kms took over 12 hours (somewhat delayed because some repairs to a fluid leak were carried out at one of the stations on route). It cost less than £20 and meals and drinks were included in the fare! The last third of the journey, approaching Chang Mai, was very impressive thanks to the mountainous scenery.

In general, it was good to watch the manual operation of signal boxes, level crossings at every station. The main railway station in Bankok is fairly large but is served by only a double track line which is quite a bottle neck for a city of this size !

I also took the train to the Bridge of the river Kwai. This was a locomotive hauled train from Bankok Thonburi station. The spectacular hair raising journey along the "death railway" was the highlight of this journey - I was standing in an open doorway, filming...

http://www.pbase.com/bariq/image/41563722

As you can see, no suggestion of any safety regulations !

The train had to cross the river Kwai bridge at a very slow pace in order to avoid the tourists who were walking everywhere.
 
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Snapper

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I'll report back shortly as I'm currently in Laos/Thailand/Malaysia and will be travelling around by train once I leave Laos. My previous trip was 10 years ago, so impressions would be out of date.
 
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