Thailand - Malaysia - Singapore Part 1

The following shall try to describe an(almost)all-rail-journey from Bangkok (Hua Lamphong Station) to Singapore through the eastern line of the Malaysian Railways, Keretapi Tanah Melayu Berhad (KTM).

Itinerary:
5-6/3/04:Special Express no. 37, Bangkok/Sungai Kolok
7/3/04: Local M/84 Wakaf Bharu/Tumpat
7/3/04: Local M/83 Tumpat/Gua Musang
8/3/04: Local M/91 Gua Musang/Kuala Lipis
10/3/04: Local M/57 Kuala Lipis/Singapore
11/3/04: CX 712 Singapore/Bangkok

The Journey:
Departure from Bangkok on time at 15:15 , "seen off" by Rob Boer who managed to just being around. 2nd class aircon sleeper, which apart from the economic factor, is always a challenge: does one want to hear and smell the progress of the trip by opening the windows and allow in fresh and mostly country-side air, accompanied every so often be a wave of engine-emitted diesel fumes (The scent of steam would be a different story)? Does one enjoy the occasionally remaining clicky-di-clack of the joints and the inevitable rattling when going over turn-outs? Is one ready to pay the price of begging that for the sake of air-movement the train may please move on, everytime it is sitting in tropical heat waiting for the up-train to pass or having to be content being at the mercy of the ceiling fan? Or sit in the sometimes ice-cold comfort of airconditioning, concealed from the outside world and life at the wayside stations? Our concealment was exacerbated by SRT's latest fad of wrapping their coaches including the windows in all-over-advertising. The fact that the "wrapping" of our coach no. 14 was - I believe - sponsored by Beer Chang did little to improve the impaired view. A consolation was, though, that Beer Chang and many other brands of drinks, alcoholic and non-and alcoholic, along with the usual array of Thai food and snacks, came inside by means of a relentless succession of "resident" and station-confined vendors. My favourite station in this regard is Nakhom Pathon, allowing a late lunch of hotx2 food (freshly cooked and spicy).

Nakhom Pathom was reached with a mere 8 minutes delay. Double track operation on the Southern Line between Bangbanru and Nakhom Pathom probably helped to be "almost in time".( The second track, laid years ago from Bang Sue, across Rama VI bridge, and up to Bangbanru, shows clear signs of decay through a long period of non-use). Wake-up time was in Pathalung where we would not have woken up had the train not be so helpful as of giving us an extra 30 minutes sleeping time, a very reasonable performance, I would say. However, upon departure and after dwelling there for half-an-hour we left Hat Yai at 8 o'clock against the scheduled 07:10. By the time we had reached Sungai Kolok it was 11:36 vs 10:40 and we had clocked up a journey-time of just over 20 hours. Most passengers had disembarked by the time the train left Yala. 7 pairs of trains serve Sungai Kolok, thereof no.171 and our 37 over all the 1143km from Bangkok. The station building, fairly sizeable, seems to have had facilities for railbound border clearance into Malaysia; yet today, passenger trains end here and it is left to the determined traveller to find his way towards the southern neighbour. There are no obvious signs helping to direct you, and no "formal" means of transport; the track continuing southbound being the best pointer. The station compound has to be circumvented by public road, passing the plinthed North British no. 175 and, on track beyond the turntable, a vintage British-made steam crane. A walkway through a small park gave access to the track which allowed the immediate conclusion that it was indeed in use.

Instead of re-joining the road for the about 1 km walk we decided to "play train" towards the border, traversing landscaped, if decaying surroundings. The German-style signal was in our favour and it appears as though we could have rolled directly into Rantau Panjang station. At least no border-style
barriers were in view before, on, or after the girder bridge accross Sungai river.
At this point the "official" road access was parted from the railway track by topography and a row of border-related dwellings. Lest encountering possibly less appreciative border guards of Thai or Malay >description, we decided to "derail" ourselves and entered through the backdoor of a building which turned out to house the office of the Tourist Authority of Thailand. Here the first relevant piece of information came to hand: yes, there are cross-border trains, one goods train per day and direction. Why no passenger trains?: mairou, I don't know!. Leaving Thailand and entering Malaysia was fairly uncomplicated, although the chap at the Thai border took longer to process the passports than the slowest of his colleagues at Don Muang would have done. Malaysia has new entry forms, Singapore-style, and the ones prepared at home could be scrapped.

Rantau Panjang station came prominently in view from no-men's-land - i.e. it is right at the border and not as remote as its former counterpart in Thailand. The view became incredibly good when crossing the track by foot bridge right after border clearance. What it revealed was a modern station with all regular facilities, an airconditioned lobby and a staffed ticket-counter. Trains? no trains, except goods trains as per demand. Daily? not necessarily. When was the station built? 1998, commissiond in 2000. Maybe.
Yes, there were trains in the past, local ones, and they may just, perhaps, reappear one day. How to get to Kota Bharu? By bus or taxi, 100 meters down the road. How good that the Malays speak English so well! 30 or 35 km by taxi, an old Datsun of 1973-vintage, strangly familiar to the one we used to have in Germany (many more did we see in Kelantan. Paradise for friends of antique Japanese cars). We were passing Pasir Mas station on the way which is the junction for the line to Thailand. The closest station to Kota Bharu is Wakaf Bahru, 10 Ringgit by taxi. There are buses, but we opted for slightly more convenience. The buses by appearance, standard and type did not offer any particular incentive to someone who prefers walking railway tracks as the next best thing to riding trains over them. The lodging in Kota Bharu was decidedly backpackerish, nothing wrong with that, friendly local Chinese landlord with a framed reward on the wall, certifying cleanliness of the place. The price was slightly above what one would have had to pay in similar establishments in Thailand. Premium for the absence of any language barrier? Rather not, as we subsequently found the general level of prices for everyday commodities just a shade above those in Thailand.
But this was, of course, the Capital city of Kelantan state. Beer? Yes, we got after a water-accompanied night-market dinner, in a small Chinese haunt next to the guest house.

The next morning saw us waiting at Wakaf Bharu station for about one extra hour for our train to Tumpat, the end of the line. Why north to Tumpat, if you want to go south to Gua Musang? Precisely, because it is the end of the line and we wanted all of it. The British style barriers of the level
>crossing closed, mainline diesel class 24, 24109, and later an inspection trolley came along; fun they were having whilst we were waiting for our train. But we got our reward: 24109 came to pick up a string of (empty) SRT goods wagons, presumable to haul them back to the Rantau Panjang border crossing. Empty makes sense: the shops and supermarkets in what we saw of Malaysia were full of Thai merchandise, rice, canned tuna, what have you. I have no trade statistics, but it seems that, in that region at least, Thai exports to Malaysia overwhelm.