I was shocked how many commentors were totally confused why Royal Caribbean
would launch an immersive train-based dining venue called “Royal Railway - Utopia Station”
on board Utopia of the Seas where diners sit in rail carriages and screens at the
windows take guests on imagined train journeys through the Wild West and Asia.
Anyone close to cruising knows that cruise lines are incredibly involved with trains
and train travel. Some even own and operate them, including some of the most famous and iconic ones,
as you will hear. That’s why they really want us to do three things:
book train travel before cruises, during cruises as excursions, and after the cruise.
Welcome aboard. I'm Gary Bembridge, helping you to get cruising right,
including those train trips and excursions your cruise line really wants us to do and why.
Let me start with, based on my experience, the best pre- and post-cruise train trips
the cruise lines offer. Many of which I have done and really added to my cruise experience.
I’ll start in Alaska as the lines are heavily linked to trains here.
First, one of the most amazing experiences I've had is taking the train from Anchorage to join a
Princess cruise sailing out of Whittier. It's called the Glacier Discovery Route. It takes
about two and a half hours and pulls up right outside where the ship docks in Whittier. They
whisked my luggage away at check in and the next time I saw it was in my cabin.
It's a beautiful experience weaving its way through the Alaskan landscape,
giving an incredible insight into the country and its beauty as it weaves its way
to the ship. It's also incredibly convenient because Anchorage is 60 miles from Whittier,
it’s hard to find taxi or car transfers and it's way more exciting and scenic than the coach ride.
Next, you may be surprised to hear that Holland America and Princess Cruises operate
the largest fleet of dome railway cars in Alaska, including what's known as the McKinley Explorer.
They use these trains as part of their land and cruise packages to transport cruise passengers
from Whittier and Anchorage to the wildlife lodges they own in Denali National Park and Fairbanks.
Their cruisers travel on beautiful glass-domed trains through the dramatic Alaskan landscapes
with breakfast, lunch, and cocktails available. The train trip takes between 9 and 10 hours
with guides giving commentary explaining the sights, wildlife, and stories of the area.
Third, although the lines don’t own it, many offer packages on one of the most iconic train
rides in the world to cruisers joining or leaving Alaska cruises in Vancouver Canada.
The Rocky Mountaineer. This is also one of the most scenic and memorable trains I have taken.
The Rocky Mountaineer, as the name suggests, travels through the Rocky Mountains on what
feels like an impossible to have built railway line due to the height and rugged terrain.
The most popular route, and the one that I did, runs between Banff and Vancouver called the “First
Passage to The West”. The trip is two days on the train and one overnight off the train in Kamloops.
The train has two classes. Silver Leaf, one level glass-domed carriages where meals are
served at the seat, and Gold Leaf, which I did, that has seating upstairs under a
glass dome (so better for sightseeing) and a restaurant for meals on the lower level
along with an open-air viewing section too. The food served was fantastic.
I recommend if doing an Alaskan cruise, you consider adding one or more of these
trips to it. The cruise shows you a narrow slice of Alaska,
and you should explore deeper inland to see the scenery but also more wildlife. And that's why
the cruise lines really want you to do a rail trip, lodge stay and a cruise to truly see it.
But what about other parts of the world? Are
cruise and train pre- and post-trips as intertwined?
In South Africa there is another memorable trip I have experienced, and that is Rovos Rail,
and several cruise lines operating out of Cape Town during the season offer packages with them.
Rovos Rail is a private rail company based in Pretoria. Set up in 1989 by Rohan Vos,
and still family owned, he converted old Rhodesia Railways Pullman carriages into lounges,
restaurant cars, and beautiful sleeping compartments with ensuite facilities.
The classic route is the one between Pretoria and Cape Town, but they also go to Victoria
Falls and even up into Tanzania. It really is a magnificent experience.
In Australia it is possible to link a cruise to two iconic and
famous Australian trains, and I have done both.
The Indian Pacific Train is the most linked as it travels between Perth, which is close
to the cruise port of Fremantle, and Sydney. On their website they list a wide range of cruise
and rail combinations with multiple cruise lines including P&O, Cunard, Ponant and more.
It is considered one of the great rail journeys of the world and takes 4 days
and 3 nights and even travels at one point along the world's longest straight stretch
of track of 478 Kilometres/ 297 miles across the Nullarbor Plain.
I went from Sydney and Perth, with off-train excursions in the mining town Broken Hill,
Adelaide where I visited the market and had a unique dinner, the ghost town in Cook,
and a dinner at the station in Rawlinna which serves the sprawling ranches around it.
The train has Gold and Platinum classes. In Platinum I had a large double cabin
with en-suite bathroom and a dedicated dining car and lounge. It shows Australia beyond the ports,
and an appreciation of the scale of the country.
For cruisers doing The Kimberley expedition cruises,
which start or end in Darwin, the Ghan is the train linked to those.
The Ghan also takes 3 nights and 4 days and travels 2,917
Kilometres / 1,851 miles between Darwin and Adelaide through the great Outback,
and so-called Red Centre. I did this train before joining Queen Mary 2 in Sydney.
There were off-train excursions in Katherine and the famous Alice
Springs to visit things like the home of the Flying Doctors.
In Europe and UK there are some links to cruising and trains,
while not as significant as in the countries I’ve spoken about so far, some fascinating options
Some river cruise lines use the Eurostar to whisk cruisers to and from the UK under the
English Channel to Paris, to join river cruises close to the Eiffel
Tower sailing down the River Seine, which I have done with CroisiEurope.
Others use the Eurostar to take cruisers to Amsterdam,
to sail the Rhine or even all the way down the Danube to Budapest.
In the UK, there are many day trips that cruise lines and cruise travel
agencies book guests on and even charter carriages on. For example,
I recently went on the Northern Belle on a day trip out of London Victoria down to
Bournemouth where most of the train was charted by Imagine Cruising, a major cruising travel agency.
The Northern Belle is rated by Conde Nast Traveller as Britain's most luxurious
train. It has refurbished Pullman carriages, with lavish meals and on-board entertainers.
A similar and equally famous train is the Belmont
British Pullman which I have also been on and does a similar thing.
These are both more like excursions which brings me to the surprisingly
large number of train excursions that cruise lines offer passengers in ports
around the world. There are four that you should look out for and consider.
The first is in Skagway Alaska, the White Pass & Yukon Train which is owned by Carnival Corporation
and the single most popular attraction for cruise passengers across the state.
It started construction in 1898 when the Klondike Gold Rush began with the aim
of making it easier to get to the goldfields over the dangerous and treacherous White Pass,
and then to shift the materials and ore back. The train stopped operating
in 1982 until it was revived as a heritage railway years later.
The trains now run right to the side of the ships and take cruisers on a 20-kilometre/
13-mile each way trip winding its way up the enormous mountain, passing old bridges
and through tunnels while the guide explains the gold rush, history of the train and the sights.
I love this train and go on every time I go to Skagway. It never tires.
An equally impressive mountain train I love to do on a Norwegian fjords cruise, is the Flam Railway.
Like the White Pass & Yukon train, this goes high up into the mountains. It's also
a relatively short train trip of 20 kilometres/ 13-miles each way between Flam and Myrdal. And
it basically weaves up the steep mountain with 21 hairpin bends, 20 tunnels and stunning views.
The train makes a stop at the incredible Kjosfossen waterfall
where an actress dressed as a legendary Huldra (a seductive forest creature in
Scandinavian folklore) dances and sings in front of the waterfall.
On a different continent is another incredible train excursion with a lot
of history. This is in Ushuaia Argentina, where over 90% of
all Antarctica cruises depart from and a key stop on many South American cruises.
It's known as the End of the World Train,
and it goes from Ushuaia through the Tierra del Fuego National Park. This is a rail line
with an extremely narrow gauge and very narrow carriages that follows the route of
a convict train that ran from 1910 to 1947 which took them out daily to collect wood.
It has an incredible history, and as I chugged along as well as stunning
scenery with waterfalls, forest, and rivers, I saw the famous wild
horses. It also stops part way at a station with local crafts on sale.
Another perhaps more accessible for most cruisers
train excursion is in the Caribbean, which is the St. Kitts Scenic Train.
This 3-hour train ride weaves its way for 30 miles / 48 kilometres around St. Kitts in double decker
carriages. It was built in the 1910s to transport sugar cane from the island’s sugar plantations
to the sugar factory in the capital city of Basseterre. It’s a fun and scenic experience.
If you want to know what it's like to be on some of these trains,
why don't you join me in this playlist here where I show you the experience of travelling
on many of these incredible trains. See you over there.