I have to confess, if it were up to me I'd be in a taxi right now - well, I'd be home by now, we disembarked the Country Link train 45 minutes ago - instead of halfway through a ferry ride that followed a short train trip from Central to Circular Quay. Mother Earth can thank my hubby for his commitment to public transportation, because this little greenie would have caved if I were traveling solo.
Today's journey started at 7.30am on a two-hour coach from Byron Bay to Casino. We waited about 30 minutes for the train, and then had over 11 hours on the train to Sydney.
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| Happy to be back in our fancy cabin car. |
In the lead up to this leg of our journey, I'd silently wondered if I would get sick if I read on the train, because I get sick when I read in a car. Yes. Unfortunately I get sick if I read on a train - not great news to learn on the first hour of my train journey.
I was able to distract myself looking at the gorgeous scenery for about two hours, then we ate lunch and it was only 12.15 and I had over nine hours left (on a side note, the hot food options put airline food to shame, and even shared the ingredients listing - absolutely no artificial colours, flavours or preservatives in my vegetarian curry, so I was happy to know I was eating a low carbon meal during my low carbon travel). My saving grace was that we had a fancy cabin, so I was able to lie flat and read while keeping the window out of view. Once I figured that out, the time flew as I read, napped, watched the scenery and attempted to photograph out the windows.
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| It can be tricky photographing out the train, it was a constant battle against blurring objects and reflections off the windows. |
Once it was dark I could read upright, and we also watched a movie on our laptop while we ate dinner and enjoyed a couple beverages from the bar car. It was so relaxing, and so nice to be able to talk with my hubby while neither of us had the stress of driving. I felt that I could have stayed on the train and gone to sleep for the night in our cozy little cabin - and seeing as it's nearly 11pm and I'm not yet home, that still sounds like a lovely option.
I'm now in a strange jet-lag state, I think because I've been sedentary all day and eating a fair amount, so I have a bit of energy and yet am sleepy at the same time. Actually, it feels very strange to have been traveling for over 15 hours and not even have crossed a timezone, let alone any international borders. But I'll take the comfort of train travel over an international flight any day!
All and all, I'm totally in love with train travel, what a delightful little green fling I've had.
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