Chennai to Delhi by train

I have just completed the longest rail journey of my life so far. 2 nights and 1 day on the Tamil Nadu express train between Chennai Central and New Delhi.

The train is very impressive. Wipe all your preconceptions about Indian trains being dirty, crowded and slow.  Whilst the suburban rush hour trains certainly are some or all of the above, the long distance sleeper trains are lovely. There are 7 ‘classes’ on Indian trains – 1st and 2nd class Air Conditioned (AC) sleeper, 3rd class sleeper, just ‘Sleeper’, chair class and one other which I couldn’t find…

Indians are quite crazy about their trains. Whenever we pass through a tunnel, everyone whoops, shouts and screams. Every 20 mins or so a Chai or Coffee wallah comes to the cabin muttering ‘chai, chai, chai’. I travelled in AC1 so shared the cabin with 3 upper class indians. All could speak great english – in fact one chap was a cricket commentator for an English speaking cricket radio station. He could do a pretty good Bumble impression too.

The first guy I shared with, Dishan, was super friendly. He lived in Sunderland and completed a masters. Now he owns an IT company in Chennai employing 70 people. He really was super friendly and gave me loads of tips on good places in Rajastan and Delhi, plus his phone number if I got lost or needed someone to translate something. Welcome break from the irritating touts of the streets.

We arrived in Delhi bang on time after the 36hour 2300km journey and I managed to find my hotel, The Smyle Inn which is down some dodgy piss-stinking back street, fairly easily. Time to see the sights!