I read with interest David Patten’s piece on his visit to Taiwan with Adventures Abroad (April ’16, pg. 6). When I wanted to visit in 2010, I couldn’t find a Western tour company that went there, so I wound up traveling by myself.
I entirely agree that the Taroko Gorge is very scenic. I slept in Hualien City rather than in the gorge, itself. I visited one day using a car and driver booked through my hotel and on another day using the local bus.
In central Switzerland, the Gotthard Base Tunnel will become the world’s longest train tunnel when it begins operation, scheduled for Dec. 11, 2016. Located between the cities of Biasca and Erstfeld, the tunnel stretches 35.42 miles under the Gotthard massif and will knock up to a half hour off the travel time between Zürich and Ticino.
Travelers can experience the deepest and longest fjord in Norway by train and boat on the “Sognefjord in a Nutshell” day tour offered by Fjordtours (Møllendalsveien 1A, N5009 Bergen, Norway; phone +47 55 55 76 60, www.fjordtours.com/en).
A 2-hour train ride from Bergen to Myrdal is followed by a one-hour ride on the Flåm Railway from Myrdal to Flåm and then a 5½-hour fjord cruise back to Bergen. Travelers can also begin and end their journey in Oslo, requiring two 5-hour train trips to and from Bergen.
London is a popular destination during the Christmas holidays and deservedly so. My wife, Paula, and I flew out of Charlotte on Dec. 25, 2015, arriving at London’s Heathrow airport on Dec. 26, and we returned from London on Jan. 1, 2016. While we expected schedules for attractions would be affected by the holidays, we discovered that transportation options were significantly reduced as well.
A shinkansen (bullet train) now links Hokkaido, Japan’s northernmost main island, to Honshu, the main island, as of March 26. At an average speed of 160 mph, the Hokkaido Shinkansen travels 513 miles from Tokyo to just south of Hakodate (with an extension planned to Sapporo) in just over four hours, an hour faster than the standard train on the route. The train traverses the Seikan Tunnel beneath the Tsugaru Strait.
Steam locomotives, royal rail carriages and ephemera are among historical pieces on display at Train World (Princesse Elisabeth 5, 1030 Schaerbeek, Brussels, Belgium; phone +32 02 224 74 98, www.trainworld.be/en), which opened in Brussels’ Schaerbeek Station on Sept. 25, 2015.
The museum is dedicated to Europe’s primary mode of long-distance transportation since 1835, when the continent’s first railway line was completed, connecting Mechelen and Brussels, Belgium.
The South Caucasus and Central Asia are not common tourist destinations, even though the area has been traversed by many conquerors and is along the old Silk Road.
Whenever friends of ours heard about the “Caspian Odyssey” tour that we were planning to take there aboard the Golden Eagle, a private luxury train, their first question inevitably was, “Where is that?” The answer required a good map.
Answering their second question — “Is it safe?” — was easy. Yes, it’s perfectly safe.
The Australian train The Ghan (Great Southern Rail; phone +61 8 8213 4401, www.greatsouthernrail.com.au), which travels between Adelaide and Darwin in 2½ days one way, with a stop in Alice Springs, was scheduled to add Platinum Club cars with full-size suites (each about twice the size of a Gold Twin cabin) on April 1, 2016.
The Platinum Club’s exclusive services include transfers to and from the station within a 50-kilometer radius; en suite breakfast; daily 2-course lunch and 3-course dinner in the Platinum Lounge, and route-specific audio commentary.
Departing every half hour for the 30-mile trip from Edinburgh to Tweedbank along Scotland’s southeastern border with England, the Borders Railway, operated by ScotRail (phone +44 0 344 811 01 41, www.scotrail.co.uk), started service in September 2015.
The new route runs through the Scottish Borders area, with stops at Galashiels, Stow, Gorebridge, Newtongrange, Eskbank and Shawfair. With hop-on/hop-off privileges, a same-day round-trip ticket from Edinburgh to Tweedbank costs £16 (near $25) and a one-way ticket, £10. Purchase tickets at a station or ahead of time online.
At press time, Sweden’s national rail operator, SJ, was planning to stop rail service to and from Denmark on Jan. 4, 2016, saying it didn’t have the manpower to comply with a new Swedish law requiring that all travelers to Sweden have their IDs checked.
Sweden’s government has temporarily suspended its participation in Europe’s Schengen Agreement, which allows for open borders between 26 participating countries, in order to stem the flow of refugees into the country. More than 150,000 refugees applied for asylum in Sweden in 2015.