OT: Trains from Beijing to Shanghai
 

Does anyone have recent experience of the Soft Sleepers from PEK-SHA? Particularly interested in the two berth version - I think they're the T trains, right?

Email our hotels in both locations and no response at all - not overly impressed... :mad:

The Z trains are the way to go. I think to have posted timetables in an earlier thread, please use the search function.

please continue to follow this thread in our China forum :)

regards,

chrissxb
moderator
european rail travel

Just be wary about buying your tickets via the links in this website. Chinatravelguide.com is good for getting the schedules but the sites offering to sell you tickets do so at a significant premium

eg. Z21 Beijing-Shanghai official prices go from RMB179 (hard seat) to RMB499 (soft sleeper). The website china-train-ticket.com is offering the same train for GBP60-115

Providing you are not arriving in Beijing and immediately leaving, I would wait until you arrive in Beijing and then get your ticket. The hotel (despite their lack of co-operation now) will be able to help. They will either have a business centre that specialises in this or the concierge will be able to organise for a small fee

nickyboy

I have read that the "Z" trains between Beijing and Shanghai don't have 2-berth Deluxe Soft Sleeper. If that's the case, the OP will indeed have to take a "T".

Thank you all!

If you have two passengers and want a private berth, book Z train two top berths ( cheaper than bottom) then when you board train there will probably
be no other people in your 4 berth cabin. A conductor lady will come around
to see what berths are unoccupied to try to upsell them to hard sleeper passengers. Lock your cabin door, then the lady will eventually give up and
you will get your private cabin at half the cost of T train, plus Z is faster.:D

I have about a 50% success rate with respect to this, but I usually cave in the and open the door after 2 minutes of knocking. Even with room mates, I have a strong preference for the Z train (unfortunately I can't recall which Z trains are operated by the Shanghai-based company; those are better than the BJ trains in pretty much every respect).

Well chances are if the train is not completely full and the door is opened
to reveal foreigners..the passengers would go to the next cabin so as
not to deal with the smell. ;)

CHANGE OF PLAN - now Shanghai to Hong Kong
 

OK, we are probably changing to SHA-HKG 'cos that gives us more time to see the countryisde in daylight hours. Is there any reason why we shouldn't do that?

And we'll plan to take the T99 from Shanghai on 20 May.
The Deluxe soft sleeper on those trains are two beds per cabin, right?

Yes, deluxe soft-sleeper is 2/cabin.

Reasons why you might not want to do it?
1. It's not cheap, compared to flying to Shenzhen;
2. Kind of time consuming. Takes about 20 hours Shanghai-HK.

from April 1, 2009. all the Z trains from Beijing to Shanghai (there were 6 I think) will be converted to D trains. D trains will be about 1 hour faster (10 hours in total duration), and about double the price.

D trains are essentially "high speed" EMUs (electrical multiple units, if you know what I mean). Z trains are locomotive-hauled.

So there will be 1 daytime D trains from Beijing to Shanghai with first class and 2nd class seats. Multiple overnight D trains (I think 6?) with all soft sleepers and 2 2nd class(seats) cars. 2 overnight T trains with hard and soft sleepers and hard-seat cars(13 hours). 1 regular 4-digit green-colored trains (people's train as featured on NY Times) with hard and soft sleepers and hard seats (18 hours+?). The price differential between the most expensive tickets and the least expensive tickets will be about 10 folds. Go Capitalism with Chinese characters!

If you have been to Japan and traveled on the Shinkansen (exactly the E2-1000 series shinkansen on the Tohuku Shinkansen). D trains on this route will look familiar enough. In fact it is a copy (licenced though, no piracy here), but with sleepers built in.

Really useful info, thanks - and so we may change our plans back to PEK-SHA. Any idea of the timings on the new trains?

The current Z trains from Beijing to Shanghai take 11hr28min, leaving around 7:30p and arriving 7a next morning.

The new D trains take 9hr59min. Leaving around 9:40p and arriving around 7:40a. Looks like they will be clustered together like they are now.