Australia - The Ghan - Class distinction

[John Ashworth]

Class distinction

The well-loved Ghan has added a luxe level of comfort and service, writes Susan Kurosawa | April 11, 2009
Article from: The Australian

LIKE cruising, train travel always seems so ripe with romanticised possibilities. Earthly ties are snapped loose and off you go, snug and separate, slicing through oceans or scenic landscapes, ensconced in the comfort of one's ship's stateroom or rail compartment. The potential for reinvention and adventure appears limitless.

This is certainly true aboard the Ghan, celebrating its 80th birthday of central Australian travel this year. And there's no better way to join the party than to sample its fancy Platinum Service, launched last September.

The unashamedly posh Platinum way comes with all the luxe bells and whistles, from 24-hour cabin service and almost double the space of Gold Service (the former top grade) to morning and afternoon teas (scones and cream, wattleseed biscuits) and nightly turn-down with hot chocolate or liqueurs. The ensuite bathrooms are well designed; there are fragrant toiletries, a good shower and piles of towels. The lounge cum sleeping cabin -- all polished Tasmanian myrtle and muted colours that echo desert ochres and scrubby greens -- are a triumph of origami-like ingenuity. Leather-topped stools slide under the coffee table, a writing desk flips flat beside the window, thin closets are deep enough to hang clothes. The beds (double or side-by-side twins) spring from the wall like those fold-down cots in New York bachelor pads of the 1960s.

The diesel-powered Ghan travels from Adelaide to Darwin with stops at Alice Springs and Katherine. In 2001, the track was extended to Darwin and now the full journey takes 2 1/2 days, two nights, 2979km of track and liberal amounts of good food, fine wine and clubby camaraderie. On our northbound trip in late March, the Ghan consists of 27 carriages, only one of which is Platinum, so we occupants of its top five compartments can't help feeling regal, given to House of Windsor limp waving. Hitched towards the front of the red-engined Ghan, and presided over on our trip by the indefatigable Barossa-born Penny Schutz, it feels like a train apart.

From the moment she announces herself as our hospitality attendant, presents a savoury platter (warmed bread, olive oil, and dukkah) and sparkling wine and brandishes her businesslike clipboard, we dub her Platinum Penny. She is combination housekeeper, nanny, steward and merry-eyed bringer of drinks. By journey's end we want to spirit Platinum Penny home with her magical Mary Poppins bag of refresher towels and cups of tea and put her in charge of our pathetically disorganised lives.

EVEN well-known territory takes on a new perspective when viewed from one's travelling armchair. From Adelaide's recently upgraded Parklands Rail Terminal, the Ghan chugs due north over the drought-yellowed Adelaide Plains, past familiar wheatlands and neighbouring Clare Valley wine country, the Flinders Ranges providing a corrugated horizon of purple so vivid it looks like a stage backdrop. We pass railway sidings with lyrical names such as Nectar Brook and pause briefly at Port Augusta in the heart of the so-called Iron Triangle, gateway to the outback.

Veteran Australian actor Bud Tingwell provides a recorded on-board commentary that plays at various intervals. In fruity tones, he tells the history of the Ghan since 1929 and how it got its name (inspired by the pioneering Afghan cameleers who carved a trail through the outback in the pre-rail era).

In the Queen Adelaide dining carriage, the shadowed horizon is streaked orange. Platinum Penny, changed from striped shirt to black waiter's jacket, appears like a freshly released genie at our table to suggest we drink Barossa wine from her home parish; we do so most gladly. The three-course Flinders Ranges Dinner includes saltwater barramundi, sugar-cured salmon, a vegetarian option and Australian cheese plate. Servings are generous, and staff balance bowls of soup and trays of drinks with the dexterity of jugglers as we surge into the blackening night. Considering the diminutive proportions of the kitchen, the food is of excellent standard and variety.

After a good sleep -- gently rocking, cradle-like, with only the occasional juddering halt -- there's a mob of brumbies at breakfast, whirling off in spirals of dust. The scenery is defined not so much by what we see as what isn't there. The heat-hazed vastness, the sense of nothingness cleanses our urban-dulled eyes. It's a mesmerising landscape of stretched horizons, clear night skies and robust vegetation. Wendy Matthews has replaced Bud on the public announcement system: "There's not a cloud in the sky ..."

We see no camels or kangaroos, although Bud has all but promised them and surely they are out there. Sightings of other life, from wading birds such as black-necked jabiru to clumps of cattle, are rare enough for me to record their existence on less than one page of my pocket notebook.

My digital camera records our progress; some of the images are blurred given the speed of our passage (average 85km/h) and the comparative slenderness of the subjects. Take the South Australia-Northern Territory border, for example. It's a post-breakfast highlight on day two but there are no border guards with triplicate forms and suspicious eyes, no queues of cars or boom gates. The train manager makes an announcement to look to our right for the border and then, whoosh, there it is: a rock and two weathered signs pointing south and north. Considering the scale of this heartland, it's a monument to Aussie understatement.

Under the lid of a deep blue sky we pass sage-green saltbush scrub and mulga, blinding bright salt lakes, red-clay pans, plains of spinifex, red river gums, desert sand the colour of dried blood and hard old hills. After a Todd River Lunch (a barbecue plate that features grilled camel steak is one option for those who are game of gut), we reach Alice Springs.

The Ghan has travelled 1559km since Adelaide and passed 41 towns; we stop for about four hours and immensely enjoy an Aboriginal Sacred Sites tour via minibus with indigenous guide Jungula Kriss. Such side trips cost extra and must be pre-booked, but passengers who just want to potter about can catch a shuttle from the station to and from town.

Progressing from Alice (its full name seems far too formal after even one visit), the MacDonnell Ranges are softening to lilac as the sun goes down. From now until we reach Katherine after breakfast on our third and final day, the vegetation is fuller and greener; I take a quick picture of what looks like a statue-still kangaroo but it turns out to be a bottom-heavy termite mound.

I am sure the cattle are real, though: they stand idly, looking despondent in that signature bovine way, under haloes of flies.

In Katherine we do a cruise of two of the 13 gorges in the Nitmiluk National Park and see the honeycomb-coloured sandstone cliff featured in Australia's first colour feature film, Jedda (1955). Then we are reunited with the luxury of the Ghan for our final meal. It's an Adelaide River Lunch and, like all the train's menus, there is a nod to native spices and relishes such as pepperberry confit and rosella flower syrup. Soon we will be in Darwin and flashing past theQueen Adelaide dining carriage's windows is a tropical savanna of mangroves, palms and pandanus, wading birds and waterholes.

PLATINUM Service is expensive compared with Gold Service (the most popular level) and the Red Service recliners favoured by backpackers and budget travellers. Is it worth it? Yes, in terms of comfort. The beds open out lengthways in Platinum compartments and this configuration minimises jolting (in Gold, upper and lower bunks fold down in transverse fashion). Platinum compartments have picture windows and the countryside slips past like clicking slides as you loll on the daytime seating. Venetian blinds can be tilted for shade or pulled right up for maximum panoramas.

There's a window (with privacy blind) from each compartment into the corridor, too, which gives an angled view to the other side of the train (hence, sunrise and sunset views). The spaciousness of accommodations makes for a premium journey that is up there with, say the Eastern and Oriental Express, which runs between Singapore and Bangkok.

Platinum Service extras are well-considered (even transfers to and from Darwin hotels are covered). Chilled towels and iced lemon tea await Platinum passengers returning all hot and pooped from whistlestop tours.

And I would even venture that dapper unraveller of crimes and connoisseur of trains Hercule Poirot would find little to complain about. In the wink of an eye, Platinum Penny would have Agatha Christie's little Belgian detective's mahogany cane and furled umbrella neatly stored, his bowler hat hung and his customary creme de menthe precisely poured.

Susan Kurosawa was a guest of Great Southern Rail and the South Australian Tourism Commission.

Checklist

The Ghan has five Platinum Service carriages, each with five twin passenger compartments, added to the train each trip according to demand. Platinum is $3050 a person one-way. All meals and featured extras are included; wine (from $6 a glass; $23 a bottle) and bar drinks (beer from $5) are additional. The northbound Ghan departs Adelaide at 12.20pm Sundays and Wednesdays and arrives at Darwin about 5.30pm Tuesdays and Fridays.

Book by June 3 (for travel to December31) for 80th birthday packages that include optional touring and accommodation extras to the value of $600 (Platinum) or $400 (Gold).