OK, here’s my review of the D307 sleeper train service from Beijing to Shanghai on Nov. 29th:
Departure: 9:36pm
Arrival: 7:35am
The train departs from Beijing South Railway Station. This station is located approximately 30 minutes from the center of the city (Tiananmen Square) by taxi (RMB 30). It is huge and very new (built for the Olympics).
The first thing you have to do upon arrival is pass your bags thru x-ray and walk through a metal detector. Some internet posters have reported that this is/was a bottleneck at the old Beijing main station. I arrived at 8:45pm and there were two lanes open and it took less than 3 minutes – maybe 4-5 people ahead of me. The security check is faster and less intrusive than an airport screening.
The station has a KFC, McDonalds, some coffee and liquor bars, and a Chinese Tea restaurant, at a minimum. While I had nibbled and drank my fair share of scotch in the Grand Club lounge prior to departing, I decided to chow down on a Big Mac, so I wouldn’t be hungry overnight. It hit the spot.
Boarding for all the D trains seems to being around 8:45. I went to my track to descend by escalator to board the train around 9:05. There is ample signage as to which train and track to board – not unlike an airport – so there was no confusion finding my track/train.
I will try to find a way to post pics later.
There was some confusion finding my car, as I was uncertain by reading my ticket as whether I was in Car 4, berth 10 or Car 10, berth 4. It turns out, after approaching a conductor, I was in Car 10. This car consists of 8, two person "Deluxe" cabins. Not only was I the only person in my cabin, but I was the only person in the whole car.
So, having saved 150 RMB by buying a top berth, I was able to move to a lower berth and had the whole cabin and car to myself. The cabin has two bunk beds, a loveseat/sofa, a half closet to hang up your suits, a storage space for your suitcase, and a table between the sofa and the bed.
One correction from other internet posters is that there is no private bathroom in each cabin, but there are two private Western bathrooms at either end of the Deluxe car. These are totally private (unlike the exposed dual sinks in the 4 person cars). Obviously, with no one in my car, there was no line or competition for the bathrooms at any time.
For me, my strategy worked out well: I was able to get a totally private cabin for RMB 1300.
I walked the rest of the train just prior to departure. I was in Car 10, which was the Deluxe car (the car even features a sofa area for communal sitting at one end). Cars 11-14 were closed: I could walk them, but all the cabins were locked (unused 4 person soft sleepers).
Car 9 was the dining car. Counter to some other posts, there seemed to be ample cold beer in the fridge. But there were no people, even just after departure, so I never spent any time there (technically, there were two Chinese people meeting/eating in a booth, but that’s it).
Cars 8-3 were the main 4 berth soft sleepers.
I walked all 5 of these cars to see what would have happened if I had a booked an upper soft sleeper. My belief is that I would have been in a 3 or 4 person cabin. I have a sense that the booking computer assigns cabins sequentially, assigning one lower berth, then the next, and the same with upper berths. Every cabin had at least two people (except there were two totally empty cabins -- but I didn't get a sense people could move to those cabins). Prior to departure, I would say most cabins had 2 people on lower berths, many had 3 people, and a few had 4 people; I sensed the 4 people cabins were mostly families traveling together. I think if i had booked a lower berth in a 4 person soft sleeper, I would have had a 50% chance that there would be only 2 people in the cabin. These are just guestimates.
As reported previously, the 4 person cabins have 4 bunk beds in each cabin and each car has 2 toilets: a Western toilet and a Chinese toilet, one at either end of each car. There are also two communal, non private wash basins.
I believe Cars 1 and 2 were the hard sleepers and the 1st and 2nd class seating cars. I may be off by a car, as I didn't walk all the way to the end or keep an exact count.
OK: a quick note about the bed and the terminology “soft sleeper”. I believe the beds, pillows, and comforters are the same in all the cabins (soft sleepers and deluxe 2 person sleepers). But I do not think these beds are particularly “soft”. They have a thin mattress, but overall I would classify these beds as “hard”. The comforters are thicker than most 1st class airline duvets, although the cotton covering is not as soft as some of the nicer airline 1st class duvet covers. Still, they are fine. The pillows are quite firm, somewhat thick, slightly larger and voluminous than a typical AA 1st class international airplane pillow. I borrowed an extra comforter from the top bunk and used one comforter as a bed cover to soften the bed below my body, and another as a blanket on top of me. Maybe if I had borrowed 5-10 comforters from some of the other empty cabins, I might have approached the feeling of a “soft” bed. C'est la vie.
This train may be a high speed railway train, but it only seemed to go at “high” speed for the last 90 minutes. Most of the time, it seemed to go at normal speed. The difference in the train noise between normal speed and high speed is considerable: the normal speed has the clickety clack, clickety clack of conventional train travel. The high speed has a whirl, almost like air travel, but louder, although quieter than the clickety clack of normal speed. In the future, I would recommend bringing along air plugs.
Another benefit of the Deluxe car is that there were not many people walking by outside my cabin, up and down the corridor. You can definitely hear people walking and talking outside the cabins, so I think this is a big advantage of the Deluxe car, with no/few passengers, versus the other full soft sleeper cars (up to 36 people), some of which had small children, and all of which have had many people walking back and forth (worst would be a cabin or car with a crying baby, although I didn’t see or hear any on my trip).
I slept solidly from 10pm-1am, and on and off from 1am to 7am. At 7am, they make an announcement and wake everyone up. The train stops once before Shanghai slightly after that announcement, and then about 30 minutes later in Shanghai.
The cabins also feature US AC outlets, individual reading lights, and TVs with headsets, but I never turned on the TV, because I had understood the channels were all Chinese and I was trying to sleep. There is also a hot pot for hot water in each cabin. I brought along a bottle of water for brushing my teeth.
The cabins also have individual temperature controls. Another advantage of a having a private cabin is not having to negotiate the temperature with someone else. I set the control to the coolest setting, although I wouldn't say it was particularly cool (I would have liked more "AC"). Maybe I did something wrong: I didn't inquire.
Upon arrival, I took about 5 extra minutes to pack up, dress, take my hanging items out of the closet, etc. I think I was one of the last people to leave the train.
Shanghai Hongqiao Station is also very modern. Another thing I feared was a long queue for a taxi. There was no queue for a taxi and plenty of taxis. However, rush hour traffic into the city (Pudong for me) was terrible at this time of morning. It took almost 75 minutes to the Park Hyatt (RMB 95). As a result, I was still 15 minutes late for my first meeting in Puxi at 10am, after a quick shower and change of clothes at the hotel.
As I reported above, I calculate that I saved at least RMB 2000 versus what I would have spent on air + hotel: I would have probably flown discounted 1st class for RMB 2100 or so and spent 1200-1300, at least, on a hotel.
For others that are ok with spending RMB 700 on a 4 person sleeper, I suspect many would also otherwise be flying coach for about the same price, thereby also saving on a hotel.
Overall, I think flying is a little easier and you are more refreshed for the next day; I agree with Moondog that I wish the train would depart a couple of hours earlier, while still arriving at 7:30, as it was a little tedious waiting for the later departure, but I didn’t check out until 5pm and spent 3 hours in the Grand Club until about 8pm, which isn't a terrible experience. Still, I would have rather been on the train and mingling about from 7-9pm, than hanging out in the Grand Club at the hotel.
So, the big question is whether I would take the train again…and the answer is probably yes, especially if I didn’t need a hotel stay credit.