14th February - Train 12262 Howrah - Mumbai Duronto

The bed and pillows at the Harrington Residency are really comfortable and , added to the general peace and quiet of the neighbourhood,  should make for a good night's sleep. R decides that, after the Fairlawn, it is too quiet and cannot get to sleep.  D has no problem getting to sleep but is then woken at 5 p.m. by the thoroughly irritating and persistent calls of a brain fever bird (common cuckoo hawk). The alarm is set for 6 a.m. anyway as we have an early start today. It is Valentine's Day today, as Vodafone India have been reminding D every hour for the last two weeks. R' s special treat is a Romantic Train Journey to Mumbai, a mere 1969 km and 26 hours, ten minutes if we are on time. To put this into context, the longest trip that can be done without a change of train in the UK is Aberdeen to Penzance, which takes thirteen and a half hours to cover 1162 km.

It is nowhere near the longest trip by a single train in India but it is the longest scheduled trip that we have done here. The train is a Duronto, one of the prestige trains, with all air conditioned coaches and meals included in the fare. We are in First AC class and a quick online check shows that we have been allocated a 2 berth coupe. You don't know if you are in a two or sharing a four until about 3 hours before departure.  It's a bit of a lottery but we have more often than not been given twos. R is pleased so we set off in a good mood. Our white AC taxi appears promptly and we can watch our progress towards Howrah on a satnav thingy on the dashboard. It is very misty with an acrid edge in the air, probably caused by dozens of small rubbish fires along the road edges. At the end of the ride the driver presses a button and the fare appears on screen. Rs 114 and no rows. Are the days of the Kolkata taxi bandits with their beaten up old Ambassadors numbered?

We are in good time so we find a spot for R to sit with the bags and D goes in search of information and chai. The large screen that shows train arrivals and departures is not functioning today so we have to rely on the smaller screens that list fewer trains. Howrah has succumbed to the fad for instant chai making machines so D searches for a traditional vendor with a big kettle and a stack of paper cups. This search is successful and as D returns in triumph our train's platform is announced, just a short walk away. There is time to drink the scalding chai before shouldering our packs and walking to platform 21. The coach indicators are not working and we decide not to walk too far down the platform , a guess which pays off as the train is soon pulled in by a shunter and our coach, H1, is quite near where we have waited. We climb on board and occupy Coupe D. It is about 9 feet x 5 feet, with a pair of bunk beds, various lights, two folding tables, a mirror and a single electric socket. Not too grubby and quite spacious really. Much better than that Voyager from Aberdeen to Penzance.

There is time for D to get off and purchase a copy of The Telegraph, Calcutta's quality broadsheet. We leave at 8.21, only a minute late, and make our way unhindered into the  countryside, taking the route of the old Bengal & Nagpur Railway. Our compartment is on the shady side of the train, for which we are thankful,  as the early mist has burnt off and the sun is bright. The AC keeps the temperature comfortable, or as R puts it, freezing. Our welcome drinks, cartons of Mango Juice, arrive as do two English language newspapers, the Times of India and the Indian Express. We now have enough newspapers to start making carrier bags. A chap takes our breakfast order and a very persistent young man wants to spray our coupe with air freshener. R does not want him to do so and he seems very disappointed.  The wait for breakfast is interminable. There is false start when a man throws open our door, sets up the two tables and disappears. Eventually our omelets, chips and peas arrive. The bread is buttered, sandwiches made and we eat. The omelets have been made fresh on the train and are very good. The bread is a bit ordinary. 

The Durontos originally had no scheduled stops between terminii although they did stop for crew changes and 'techical halts'. This has changed and there are now a few planned passenger stops but these are quite few and far between. On this trip there are only five, as opposed to 33 between Aberdeen and Penzance. Kharagpur is a pretty important junction west of Kolkata but does not rate a stop. As we head further west it is easy to spot when we leave West Bengal. The railings and fences stop being blue and white and become red and white instead. Another giveaway is the text that Vodafone send, bidding subscribers welcome to the new state. In pretty short order we get Jharkhand, Bihar and Odisha. A bit later we get Chattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. The train climbs a bit after Kharagpur and the countryside is quite parched looking. Our first stop is Tatanagar home of the Tata organisation and dominated by grim looking factories.  This is one spot that doesn't feature on the Incredible India! adverts.

From Tatanagar the line heads roughly south west, through some forests. Soup is served followed by the customary long wait for the rest of meal. R has veg curry, D has chicken curry, both served with daal, chapattis,  rice and curd. It's pretty good and we tuck in. Afterwards there is ice cream and two guys who languidly mop the cabin floor. R has read the Duronto menu online and notes that 1AC customers can have tea or coffee 'on demand'. We enquire and are told "Tea at 4.30". On reflection we were maybe a bit polite when we asked. We need to learn to Demand! We pass through a stretch of forest with bright orange blossom on the trees but D is too slow with his camera. As we approach a station called Ib, the shortest station name on Indian Railways, D readies his camera but a goods train blocks the entire length of the station,  so no photo. As an aside, it is interesting to note that the IR abbreviation for Ib is IB. We then pass through an area dominated by huge open cast coal mines. Everything is covered in black dust and living around here must be a nightmare.

Tea arrives at five and is a fairly substantial affair with a sandwich, a fried savoury of some description,  a bag of salted almonds, some sweets, a very crumbly ladoo and, best of all, a very superior teabag. This is much better than the breakfast ones, and we get tea for two from one bag, squirrelling the other away for brekker tomorrow.  Bless you Twinings. Our next stop is Bilaspur. We don't know much about this place but are forced to conclude that there is a lack of entertainment,  as a small crowd gathers on the platform to peer in at us. One chap quite openly takes photos with his phone while a couple have a good close stare, disappear and return with a friend in tow for another gawp. D checks his fly but it's fine. 

When we get going again darkness is starting to fall so we change for dinner, donning our pyjamas, and declare the cocktail hour. This is where having a coupe comes in really handy. At around 7.30 soup arrives, brown and spicy, possibly mulligatawny. We manage to stay awake until the main course is served at 8.50. We think that we have ordered Continental non-veg. It is roast chicken with gravy, a bowl of boiled vegetables,  rice out of a mould, curd and gulab jamuns. We even get a bonus flask of hot water and two paper cups. Lucky that we held back a tea bag. The man comes to take our breakfast order. Time for bed.

We sleep pretty well and it is light when we get up. Overnight Vodafone have welcomed us to Maharashtra. We are passing through an area of what look suspiciously like vineyards.  A little research confirms that this is probably correct, as we are quite close to Nashik, centre of the Indian wine industry. The average per capita annual wine consumption in India is 9ml. A regular pub glass of wine is 175ml. We tried it once and it's not that bad. Bed tea arrives with English Marie biscuits.  This provokes a rare outburst of xenophobia from R who describes them as 'very ordinary'. The hot water is also declared substandard on the grounds of insufficient temperature for making decent tea. One of the small stations that we pass through is Devlali, also known as Deolali, onetime site of a British Army transit camp that gave rise to the term 'doolally', used to describe temporary madness induced by heat and boredom. 

The steady progress that had kept us at around 10 - 15 minutes behind time is interrupted, and we make several unscheduled stops. When we get to the last scheduled stop, Igatpuri, we are around 40 minutes down. This place is at almost 2,000 feet up in the Western Ghats, the mountain range that parallels India's west coast. Historically this station was where locos were changed as the network in Mumbai operated on DC current,  whereas the rest of the country is on AC. Today it is a good chance to buy chai from a platform vendor to make up for the bed tea. The descent from the ghats is steep, and taken very steadily. Some of the upward bound trains have banking engines at the rear to provide extra power. Between the numerous tunnels there are glimpses of spectacular scenery.  The descent is 300 metres (1000 feet) in 14km. About 1 in 47 although the gradient is not constant,  so some stretches must be steeper.

All too soon we are running into the outskirts of Greater Mumbai, with its gleaming new high rise blocks and railside shacks almost rubbing shoulders. Every shack seems to have a satellite dish. Some of the high rise blocks are covered in bamboo scaffolding even as high as fifteen floors. Scary. We pass, re-pass and are passed by busy commuter trains heading into Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, known for ease as CST, or even VT (Victoria Terminus) These are the trains featured on the endlessly repeated BBC documentaries, where you can stand at an open door while travelling. We pull into CSTM at 11.15, forty five minutes late.