hard sleeper
we’re headed on a 7 hour trip to datong. this wasn’t the first choice of destination. we’re trying to get to wutai shan, one of the sacred buddhist mountains, and left it too late to book our tickets, so that all that were available were “hard seat”.
train travel in china falls into three different classes. “Hard seat”, “hard sleeper” and “soft sleeper”. hard seat is the cheapest for a reason, as it is essentially “chicken bus” class – only not as nice. it involves sitting on wooden pews, smooshed up against throngs of people, all their families luggage, and several pieces of livestock. not what you want on a 13 hour journey.
hard sleeper is usually the backpackers’ ticket of choice – pricier than the hard seat, it’s still better value for money than the plush “soft sleeper”. hard sleeper is basically rows of bunk beds. if you’re a small person like me, and don’t need a lot of room, the middle or top bunks are your best bet – you can get a little space to yourself and stretch out to nap and pass the time. provided, of course, you aren’t nothered by the thick curtains of cigarette smoke which hang down from the ceiling, or the less pleasant aromas which waft upward. the people on the bottom, bunk, howevere, get shafted, as during the day, the bottom bunks are used as a communal seating/eating/spitting area. not so nice, though it does offer advantages to the taller guy who can’t be clambering up and down.
so really, hard sleeper is the preferred option, if at all possible. and faced with the extortionate cost of soft sleeper, the horror show of hard seat, or the rising cost of another 2 days in beijing waiting for our choice of tix, we decided to head to datong, and take a bus from there.
see you when we get there.
