What a train ride!

AndreasVN wrote:

...
I am glad i did, you get to see a part of the country that is only accessible by train and the coastal stretch is amazing.
...

The landscape is indeed spectacular, free of buildings which have lined the national highway more so than the railroad meaning if you travel by automobile/motorbike, you're more likely going to see development than natural landscape. 

However, I was unable to freely enjoy 100% of the natural beauty because the filthy windows and the "cage" obscured about 50% of my view.  I wondered why there are cage screens on windows of the railcars. 

Was it to:
1) prevent people from entering/exiting the railcars via window instead of using the door?
2) prevent vendors from selling to passengers via window?
3) prevent passengers from sticking their heads out the window and getting smacked by a tree branch?

ngohly wrote:

... There were quite a few incidents of rock throwing and horror stories were exchanged about who got injured and how.
...

Now I know the answer.  I had guessed it maybe had to do with protection but couldn't imagine people throwing rocks at trains.  That's just like throwing rocks at busses and motorbikes.  It just doesn't pop in your head initially.

As for the dirty windows, I guess the train is geared towards functionality (i.e. moving people) than for asthestics or "value added service" (i.e. providing clean windows for passengers to enjoy the view).  Both the northbound trip and the southbound trip had filthy windows.

That was probably my biggest beef about not getting to 100% view the beautiful landscape..so I had to settle for 50%, squinting through the cage bars and the dirt specs on the windows to catch a glimps of water buffalos bathing in ponds, golden fields of rice, steep vertical mountains that have trees growing...trees can grow directly on rock?  Wow!

ngohly wrote:

...and I vowed to never take it again b/c of the collusion between ticket office agents and black market sellers. Impossible to buy tickets at the station. They're always out for all days of the week....

I guess now I know why.  In the United States, we call these Scalpers.  They probably buy up all the tickets during the Tet and other heavily traveled holidays.  When people can't buy them at the stations, then they have to go across the street to buy them from "agents".

charmavietnam wrote:

I was planning to go some trip by Viet Rail
How about fare compared to flight?
Bus or train, comfortable?

Air travel will cost more because you get there faster and bus fares will be cheaper since they have alot of competition. 

After reading many stories of bus drivers dozing off at the wheel and plunging rivers, speeding and losing control, passing wrecklessly, I think traveling by train is a safer land travel option.

Consequently, I did noticed many foreigners traveling to and from Nha Trang using the Iron Road.  The conductors speak Viet-lish (kind of like English but overwhelmingly accented by their native Vietnamese tongue making them barely understandable by foreigners and they end up just pointing to things.)  Had a conductor try to tell a foreign backpacker to go back to her assigned seats at a station stop by saying "seat number" a bunch of times then finally pointed to her ticket.  Another conductor was trying to solicit an upgrade fee from a Korean girl by asking her why she didn't buy an air conditioned seat when she was sweating in the non-air-conditioned railcar (you have to pay the conductor some "gratuities/tips" to get an upgrade).  He ended up pointing to her ticket but she just gave him a blank stare.

jimbream wrote:

Take the full trip from Ha Noi to Ho Chi Minh city and I can guarantee a dose of land sickness when you finally hop off. The swaying and the clickety clack of the the carriages really puts your body in another physical realm.

It's actually more "stable" than the busses/shuttles that transport people by the asphalt road.  By stable, I mean, the train engineer isn't speeding, driving wrecklessly to make time, passing motorbikes, driving and weaving to avoid potholes, etc.

You do get swaying and clickety clacks of the railcars but that's normal considering Vietnam's Iron Road hasn't developed to any extent comparable to the Japanese Shinkansen or the Eurorail.

DirtyPierre wrote:

In 2012 I took a group of 8 on a train trip from Saigon to Vinh in the North. I bought all the tkts directly at the Saigon station and the kind lady pointed out that as I was over 60 I was entitled to 20% discount. So I went home and got my Seniors card and returned and got my discount on an already amazing price of 1 million dong, about $50. what I did was break the journey into 4 to 5 hr segments on aircon day trains. That way we had comfortable seats and a nice view of the country side. I remember we ate a lot of boiled eggs that we bought on the train which ended up biting us on the bum as it were, so I don't recommend you do that. Lol. We would then hop off and spend 2 or 3 days exploring the area. Some places like Danang we stayed a week so that we could visit Hoi An and ride over the Hai Van Pass to Elephant Head Springs. We also did a side trip from Dong Hoi to the river caves in the Phong Nha National Park. So in conclusion I don't recommend doing the Saigon to Hanoi train trip in one go as the positive things get overridden by some of the negatives. Break the journey and you will enjoy it more.

Nice to get some respect for being an old fart doesn't it? 

Your idea of breaking the trip in 4-5 segments is an excellent idea.  Both the to and return trip passed through Đà Nẵng in the middle of the night so I didn't get to see anything about this remarkable city (so I've read).

DirtyPierre wrote:

Being an old fart has its advantages.
When I took a group of people to Dam Sen Water Park in HCMC I got in for free when I showed them my Seniors card.

Yah, the Vietnamese culture highly respects the elderly.