Заявка. The Travel Connoisseur

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The Travel Connoisseur

On the great European train journey

The Travel Connoisseur finished packing his wooden trunk and attempted to get some sleep despite his usual pre-departure anticipation. He would need to be fresh, as the next morning was the start of a grand journey, one of those once-in-a-lifetime affairs aboard a historic express train which was to take him from Paris to Istanbul in five days. He drifted to sleep, with sweet thoughts of the retro romance of crossing Europe in old-school luxury.

The next day, dressed with the care people used to take in the golden age of travel, he walked down the platform of Gare de ParisEst, his trunk rolled carefully behind him by a porter. He presented his papers to the uniformed steward at the carriage and was promptly escorted to his cabin, where an ice bucket and raspberries were already waiting.

“Tight but cosy,” he thought, taking in his quarters, made up of a mere few square metres. Settling down, he quickly got rid of the two squat on-board glasses, taking out his own red crystal flûte ready to toast the departure. But as the train began to move, he understood the utilitarian design of the supplied glassware. His tall elegant tower of crystal, unused to the shaky tempo, swayed precariously for a few moments before crashing to the floor in a thousand pieces. It was the first sign that things might be different in this palace on wheels.

As the express made its way toward the German border, he discovered that in addition to the occasional lack of data coverage, the train also missed some rather expected comforts, such as a shower. In TTC’s case, this felt especially disastrous as he realised that his otherwise immaculate hair could barely be touched up over the coming days.

Nonetheless, making the most of where he was, that evening he followed the prescribed black-tie suggestion and wandered into the dining car wearing a slim-fit tuxedo. His hopes of meeting some international jetsetters quickly dried like the boutonnière that adorned his jacket. Almost all the passengers were several generations ahead of him and conversed with a particular refined vocabulary, as if living a century ago. The setting was nothing less than a vanity fair on wheels.

By the end of the meal, however, as he nibbled on the petit fours, TTC had come to appreciate some aspects of this throwback. At least there weren’t any awkward solo traveller meet-and-mingles, as was common in the modern world.

The next morning, the train stopped in Budapest and, veering away from the sightseeing tour the rest of the passengers were heading toward, TTC hurried instead to a local hotel with a change of clothes and a hairdryer. A couple of hours later, feeling much more himself, he rejoined the tweedclad group and even managed to glimpse a few sights along the Danube.

By the next day, as the blue train passed through the picturesque landscapes of Romania and Bulgaria, TTC had decided to fully embrace the odd comforts of this century-old mode of travel. Despite a niggling backache from spending too much time sitting ramrod straight in vintage armchairs, he relaxed enough to enjoy the views, the smell of the antique furniture and the unique sound the oak panels emitted inside the carriages.

That night, he joined his fellow lady and gentleman travellers, agreeing to partake in a detective game inspired, quite predictably, by Agatha Christie’s Murder On The Orient Express. That helped to spin a few hours as the dimly lit Bar Car came alive with mysteries and stories – and transported TTC not just forward toward his destination but also truly back in time.

It was a much more satisfied traveller who stepped down on to the platform of Istanbul’s Sirkeci station, bidding farewell to his temporary home on wheels. As he walked away, it dawned on him that he had travelled in Sleeping Car 3309, the very same carriage that was part of the 1929 service that got stuck in a snow drift outside Istanbul for 10 days. “At least we now have the modernity of arriving on time,” he thought as he hurried back to the comforts of shower-equipped luxury hotels and airline lounges. There’s a reason why some journeys, despite being memorable, are referred to as “once in a lifetime”.

(Source: Condé Nast Traveller Middle East, May 2017)