Training ...

Every morning and every afternoon, on the days I work, I get the train. I happen to enjoy train travel. Daily train travel isn't as grand as catching say, the Indian Pacific, but it is always fun to do. I get on at Campbelltown and get off at Padstow. There are several stations inbetween. Sometimes in the afternoon the train is an express and misses a good number of stations, but the train in the morning and the night trains after classes stop at all stations but the next two after Padstow. It is an interesting thing to do. Unless you know someone on the train, you never talk. Some people talk on their mobile phones, but mosty they don't. Sometimes a person will sit with their laptop open, either watching a DVD or doing some work.

I am fascinated by watching people and what they do, how the behave and what they are talking about with each other. It was better when I took the train to and from Central in the City, it was a longer trip. Mostly, these days I do a crossword book and ignore the trip. I have seen it so many times over the past twelve years. I have seen buildings built, houses and streets built, I have seen projects abandoned. I have seen wooded lands laid bare and ugly house built on them, roads and shops put in. I watched them build the F4 into the tunnel, and then they put a brick wall up so you cannot see in or out.

The Indian Pacific travels from Sydney to Adelaide, and on to Port Augusta. It used to stop at Port Pirie, but no longer does. I have never taken it past Port Augusta. Port Augusta is about an hour's drive from Whyalla, where I used to live. It is about a 30 hour trip between Port Augusta and Sydney, through some of the loveliest country you are ever likely to see, and the most desolate mooonscapes you are ever likely to see. You will see every animal imaginable, both native and domestic and some in between. You have to travel it yourself to really appreciate the grandeur of it. It really is Australia up close and in the raw.

I would love to do the trip for Port Augusta to Darwin on the Ghan. These trips are very expensive these days, and I wonder if they still have third class where you have to sit up the whole way.

I have travelled from as far south as Adelaide to as far north as Cairns by train. The Indian Pacific to Sydney, the XPT to Brisbane and the Queenslander to Cairns. Over about a week all up on trains. Just the best way to travel.

So, no matter how blase I am about daily train travel, I always enjoy it.