Shosholoza Meyl Premier Classe

Honeymoon - Day 16 & 17

My first overnight scenic train ride ever! We returned the car at the Park Station (not without difficulty) and stepped into the train station. We've read reviews of how different it is inside and outside of the station. Inside it looks like an okay train station in a major city. Outside it's not so safe...

Good morning, Johannesburg! (view from the hotel room)

Once we were in, we looked for signs of the check in desk. The signs were not so clear and we went downstairs to look around. Finally we found the Premier Classe arrival lounge in a corner near a supermarket. Premier Classe only runs once every Thursday (that's why we couldn't fit in Kruger national park, but Pilanesberg exceeded our expectations).

We checked in, dropped our bags and went to the supermarket. I realized we haven't seen or been in any supermarket for two weeks 😅

The arrival lounge provided coffee, tea and cookies. At one glance I figured I was the only Asian there. Can't say I was very comfortable with that. In fact, very uncomfortable. But then, honestly, I'd be quite surprised if there were a lot Asians. Not many people I know would prefer to go to Johannesburg given that the flights are more expensive than going to Japan, Europe or US. Also, even if they would come to South Africa, most people would want to "maximize" their time due to limited days of vacation leave so one would choose to fly than taking train.

The boarding time was supposed to be 10am. However, like what Mr. B has read, there's usually a delay. Eventually we boarded the train at around 10:15am. Not so bad.

Our cabin was 8E. It's actually more spacious than I thought - it's like the size of my bedroom at my parents' place in Hong Kong. 😄 There's a sofa-like seat on each side, facing each other. Each side had 2 pillows and a blanket. A window on each side.

We put the bags up on the shelf above the sliding door, and went to the lounge cabin for the briefing. The crew introduced themselves and let us know the timing of the meals on board. Juice, sparkling wine and snacks were provided during the briefing.

After that, we went back to our room and I had some shut eye. At 12:30pm, we went to the dining car and Mr. B was waiting eagerly for our lunch to arrive. It's table service and as usual more formal than it's necessary. (I was again conscious that I was under dressed.) We had smoked salmon and cream cheese as starter, chicken leg and rice as main, and cheesecake as dessert. The smoked salmon and chicken were quite good, but the cheesecake was so so. It's something I considered as fake cheesecake - those that's with a lot of gelatine. 😑

After lunch we went back to the room. Our activities inside the cabin were mainly looking at the scenery outside, reading and resting. There's afternoon tea as well but we skipped it as we were still full and lazy to get out of the cabin.

Dinner was served at 6:45pm. Soup as starter, some kind of fish and beef as main, and some blueberry gelatine thingy as dessert. There were 5 courses in total but I skipped cheese and coffee/tea.

When we were back in our cabin, our beds were made! The back of the sofa was pulled down onto the seat. It's covered with white sheet and warm blanket. Pretty cozy for a train cabin!

Now, what about shower? There's a shower room in each car. It provides hot water. As for shower gel, shampoo, towels and slippers, they are placed in the cabin. You can try out showering on the move if you like lol. Again, I didn't want to know where the water would go Haha!

There's a shared shower room in each car, next to the toilet.

Inside the shower room. Shower head at rhe ceiling.

The next morning, we went to dining car at 8:45am to have breakfast. The staff was quite unfriendly to us...Perhaps it's because we're quite late. Breakfast is served until 9am. She didn't say that there would be both cereal and hot breakfast. Just came to just and blasted out a list of names in one breath. I asked her to repeat and she used the same machine gun speed to fire at me again. She looked irritated. I only caught corn flakes so that's what I ordered. I then requested for warm milk and she looked at me like I was a freak. I feel that I'm being treated like that because I'm Asian. I strongly believe that she would react differently if she were talking to a Caucasian.

When we went back to the cabin after the unpleasant breakfast, the cabin was reverted back to the original sitting position. There's a delay and we stopped at one of the stations for almost an hour. We're not in a hurry so that's okay for us. Several crew members came and opened our door for different purposes:

- One came to ask if we needed a taxi. We said we were going to the Southern Sun to pick up our rental car and asked if it's within walking distance. He said it's not and suggested that we took a taxi. He told us that locals got local prices for non-meter taxi but for tourists he recommended meter taxi. We went with his suggestion.

- one came to collect money for the beverages we consumed (food was included but all beverages including water were at our own cost). We didn't have small notes and she said she would come back with the change. We never saw her again.

- one came to collect the pillows and towels.

- one came to collect "voluntary" tips

Apart from those times that we were disturbed, we spent most of the time reading, if not looking at the scenery outside.

At around 2pm we arrived in Cape Town. Our 27.5 hour scenic train ride on Shosholoza Meyl had come to an end...The train, cabin, dining car, toilet etc were good and it's a nice experience. The only problem was the service...

Upon arrival we were led to a lounge, and a bunch of taxi drivers were waiting for us with our names. We went to our taxi driver and he drove off without confirming where we were going. When asked, he said we were going to Waterfront. We clarified and gave him the confirmation letter of Eurocar. He apparently didn't know where it was, and passed us his GPS machine. We tried but couldn't find it there. Anyway, we suddenly saw "Southern Sun" on top of a building when we looked outside and asked him to go there. At the entrance, a staff confirmed that there's an Eurocar desk inside.

We took our bags and the taxi driver put up two fingers as the taxi fare. Mr. B gave him 20 rands, and the taxi driver said it's 200 rands! But it's just 3-5 minutes ride including the time we waited at the lights! Mr. B was furious and said he must be joking. He gave him 100 reluctantly and we rushed off. The taxi driver didn't push further. Later I saw that meter taxi charges 8.8 per km...