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Great Rail Journeys’ round the world itinerary covers 23,000 miles in 50 days. Rob Gill hears about the first complete trip tour.
It may have taken Phileas Fogg 80 days to travel around the world but Great Rail Journeys got the job done in just 50.
Seven customers took part in Great Rail Journeys’ circumnavigation of the world – starting and ending in London, as did Mr Fogg and his trusty valet Passepartout in Jules Verne’s legendary novel, Around the World in Eighty Days.
The specialist operator’s itinerary was of course aided by several flights to link up with train services across the US, China, Mongolia, Russia and back towards the UK on the Venice Simplon-Orient-Express.
The tour was rounded off by a journey on the Belmond British Pullman from Folkestone to London’s Victoria station, where the small group of intrepid global travellers were greeted by GRJ’s chief executive Peter Liney, who whisked them off for a glass of celebratory champagne at the nearby Goring Hotel.
“We have run the trip before but it’s the first time that we’ve had people complete all 50 days in one go, covering all 23,000 miles,” says Liney. “Previously customers have done sections of the trip – North America or China – but not all of it.”
The group of seven, including three clients from the UK and two Australian couples, paid £20,000pp to go on the trip which began by flying to New York for a stay at the Waldorf Astoria in Manhattan.
The tour included taking several Amtrak services across the US to San Francisco, followed by high-speed rail trips in China, the Tsar’s Gold Private Train from Mongolia to Moscow, and the Orient-Express from Venice to Paris. “You’re doing such long distances – New York to San Francisco is 3,500 miles – but you’re seeing parts of countries you wouldn’t otherwise see,” adds Liney.
“If you fly, you see nothing. Coach trips also don’t compare to being in a comfortable train where you can move around easily. It’s really an extraordinary view of the world.”
The globetrotters were not just on their own during their 50-day odyssey as they joined other GRJ clients who were travelling on individual legs of the trip.
“They got to meet other people along the way,” explains Liney. “It’s important for them to mix with other groups – it would have been a bit intense to travel with just seven of them for the whole journey. We also used four tour managers for the different legs of the trip.
“When they got back to London Victoria, they all said they loved it. The feedback was fabulous and they had thousands of pictures. There was a sense of achievement because they were the first to do it all in one go.”
Liney admits that such an expensive and long trip has “limited appeal” and tends to attract retired customers aged over 60 who are “well travelled”.
“We’re the leading escorted rail company in the world and this is our flagship tour. It’s the big daddy of them all – it’s our longest and most expensive tour.
£20,000 is a lot of money so it has a very limited appeal. But when you work it out, that’s only 86p a mile – although we’re not attracting people on price.
“Our customers aren’t trainspotters, they are enthusiastic about travel by rail – there’s a romantic connection with train travel, particularly in the UK. They weren’t asking questions about the trains or gauge sizes.”
Great Rail Journeys plans to run the global rail trip again in 2017 over 51 days departing on August 16, with prices starting at £24,245pp.
“We will only have one departure per year and we already have some bookings for next year,” says Liney. “We would not want to take more than 20 in the group. The itinerary will be pretty much the same as this year with some minor changes.”
As Jules Verne wrote back in the 1870s: “It’s really useful to travel, if you want to see new things” – a sentiment Great Rail Journeys’ customers must surely agree with.
