XPT Melbourne to Brisbane

["Kym Columbine" <KymColumbine@bigpond.com>]

Well, I survived my Melbourne - Brisbane XPT trip - first class.  Thanks for
the advise everyone who provided it.  Much roomier and quieter than the
previous trip I'd done economy class to MEL/SYD.

Caught ST2 on Monday (1/5) night, on time departure from Spencer Street,
before running into trouble on the grade through the Bunbury Street Tunnel.
Felt like the rear power unit was trying to take itself back to Spencer
Street!!   Conductor (sorry, passenger attedant) came through the cars
assuring that all was OK, and a stop was made at the Sunshine Standard Gauge
platform for "the driver to carry out repairs".  This fixed the problem for
awhile, until the climb up the Jacana Flyover when the same occured, only
worse because of the steeper grade.  After a further stop at the signal
adjacent to Broadmeadows station, repairs were again carried out and after a
stop of about 15 mins the train was on it's way again.   All was well until
between Seymour and Benalla when an unexplained stop was made followed by a
signifigant amount of very slow running.

Arrival in Albury was 70 minutes late, and by the time the train reached
Moss Vale it was 2 hours late and was held there for the departure of a City
Rail service to Sydney around 7.00am.   My friend who picked me up at Moss
Vale said that he'd been told by station staff at Moss Vale  when he turned
up at 04:40 to meet me that the train would be at least two hours late there
due to a failure of one of the power units.   Speed seemed normal out of
Albury, but was considerably slower out of Wagga Wagga, but didn't notice
any more stops etc as I fell asleep.

After spending the day in Sydney with friends visiting the Aquarium and
Dariling Harbour, it was onto NT1 for the trip to Brisbane.   Again an
ontime departure, and this time some fairly smooth running.   The train was
busy all through the trip, with a large number of passengers alighting at
Casino.   Arrival in Brisbane was 30 mins late, explained as being casued by
refueling of the loco's and speed restricitons during the night.  Ending an
eventful trip, at least by train as I had to catch a bus from Brisbane to
Toowoomba, unfortunately.

Kym