[roamer]

Originally Posted by tom

It's a great way of getting around (and is as cheap as chips - even for 1st Class) if you have a bit of time or using the overnight services to save a bit of cash on travel/accommodation costs.
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The best site by far to start reading up is seat61 ..... it also covers the other countries in the region.


Seat61 - Thailand

Thanks tom,good link

Given enough time the journey from Kuala Lumpur
or Penang to Bangkok sounds good(or the other way around of course), enjoyed the couple of travellers tales on this link,same site but starting from
Singapore/Malaysia, "The Jungle Line " and
"Butterworth to Bangkok"

"Traveller Henrik Meurs took the slow train from Gemas to Wakaf Bahru. "The trip on the Jungle Railway to Kota Bahru is one of the most beautiful train trips possible. The scenery can only be described as breathtaking. There are quite a few stops during the first two or three hours. After that, villages become rare and the train starts climbing the first flat mountains. From then on we enjoyed endless views over primary rain forest, large trees interrupted by exuberant plants and monkeys at play. After 4 or 5 hours, when you just start to think that you might have seen all the wonders the Malaysian jungle has to offer, the train enters the mountains. Words fail me to describe the beauty of the scenery of these two or three hours during which the engine pulls you through the mountains topped with rain-forest, over wooden bridges and through narrow gorges. The fare was just 21 Ringgit, about $5..!" Pictured: Jungle Line scenery. Photo courtesy of Hendrik Meurs.

Unlike the modern Malaysian trains on the direct sleeper trains to/from Singapore and KL, slow train 91/92 is old and basic, but the ride more than makes up for this. There is plenty of local transport available from Khota Bahru to the Thai frontier at Sungai Kolok. Train times from Sungai Kolok to Bangkok are shown on the Thailand page under 'Bangkok to Southern Thailand'.
Traveller's reports - Butterworth to Bangkok:

Traveller Sheena Clowes reports from regular journeys between Singapore, KL, Penang and Bangkok: I am an older lady who loves to travel alone and overland, so here are some recent pointers for added comfort for these journeys which I have made many times over the past few years, most recently today from Butterworth-Bangkok. First of all, the Internasional Ekspress (Butterworth-Penang) is late both leaving and arriving around 20% of the time. Be prepared for it, not stressed by it. For instance, it left yesterday at 15.45 instead of 14.20, and arrived in Bangkok at just before 2pm today. But even with my delaying for a cup of good coffee at the station in Bangkok, I was checking into my hotel at 2.45pm - I wouldn't be checking into a city-centre hotel 45 minutes after landing at Bangkok international airport, would I!?

Take some water and a light snack - biscuits, maybe - for the first few hours of the Internasional Ekspress when there is no restaurant car. If you forget, you can get food at the bus station just a short distance from the train station, or if you are coming from Georgetown, at the stalls at the jetty there. The Internasional Ekspress carries local passengers without reservations between the first station after Butterworth to the last station before Thailand, and all stations in between, so don't spread your belongings out too much, you will end up with them all on your lap soon enough! If you travel on the newer 2nd class sleepers - the ones made by Daewoo in South Korea - there are two washbasins outside the toilets, very handy for cleaning teeth etc in the morning. There is also usually hot drinking water available at the end of the 2nd class sleeper for making tea, instant noodles, re-heating baby food etc. In the centre of these coaches there is an electricity point where you can recharge your phone. Make friends with the people sitting there, to keep an eye on it, and only take as long as you need (it doesn't need to be fully charged for a quick phone call) as other people need to charge their phones, too.

The lower berth on the Internasional Ekspress's newer 2nd class sleepers offers an unprecedented (in my experience) amount of space as it is a full metre wide. The size of the berth, and the way the curtains hang around them, and their length, means that even an arthritic old woman like me can change clothes in privacy and rearrange her overnight case. I find that lying along the length of the carriage in this type of berth much more conducive to a sound night's sleep that lying across the width of it, as is often the case in sleepers. If you like to read in bed, take a booklight or head torch, and that if you need pitch darkness for sleeping, take some sort of eyeshade. You only get one pillow per berth, so fold up some soft clothing if you like your head higher. Spare pillows are not carried, so if all berths are full there will be none to spare. The cotton blanket that you are issued with is freshly-laundered and I find gives just the right degree of cosiness when wearing a T-shirt and cotton trousers. Some people are too cold - the air-conditioning is fairly fierce - and need to put on more clothes to keep warm! If you don't want an Asian breakfast or a rather strange Western breakfast, you can just buy a cup of coffee for 20 baht. It's instant but good and hot and strong, just the ticket with a couple of Malaysian "breakfast biscuits" and a carton of yoghurt you bought the previous day in Butterworth or Georgetown. The food offered by the "Bogie Restaurant" (orders taken after crossing the border; dinner is served after Hat Yai and breakfast at whatever reasonable hour people are getting up) is generally very good if you like Thai food.

The restlessness of the southern provinces of Thailand is evidenced by the armed guards on the train overnight and a policeman patrols the sleeper coaches randomly through the night - in stocking feet! However, I have never been aware of any problems in the border areas while I have been travelling."

http://www.seat61.com/Malaysia.htm#Fares

[bigphill67]

Originally Posted by The best site by far to start reading up is seat61 ..... it also covers the other countries in the region.


[URL="http://www.seat61.com/Thailand.htm"

Seat61 - Thailand[/url]

cheers tom good site thinking of going to penang malaysia for a couple of nights next trip might take overnight train from bangkok to butterworth thanks again