Things on the Canadian train do settle into a rhythm, but not one the passengers are accustomed to. A 4,466 kilometre 4 day 4 night trip from Toronto to Vancouver is like nothing you’ve ever experienced before and by the end of it you don’t care how the time goes by. The train is its own world, not time, but food, views and talks.
Mornings Start Slow
You wake up to the gentle swaying of the car and the sound of coffee being poured in the Skyline car. Early risers gather in the glass dome to watch the sun rise on whatever landscape the night has delivered, be that the rocky lakes of the Canadian Shield or the endless flat of the Prairies. Breakfast in the dining car is served in set sittings with a changing daily menu that always has a vegetarian option. You sit wherever the host places you, meaning you may have your first meal with a retired couple from Australia and your second with a family from Winnipeg.
Afternoons Are for Watching and Wandering
The train across Canada offers few organised activities in between meals, and that’s the point. Most people wander between the dome cars, the lounges, and their cabins. The Park Car at the rear of the train has a curved lounge with panoramic windows and a bar, it tends to fill up in the late afternoon. There are days when the staff offer wine-tasting sessions or short histories/geographical presentations, but no time commitments. Many read, nap or sit and stare out the window for hours. It is a very gradual landscape, one that you don’t perceive as moving from forest to farmland to mountain, unless you are told, so you’re not expecting that to take place.
Evenings Feel Like a Moving Restaurant
The highlight of the day is dinner. The dining car has white tablecloths and proper tableware and the three-course menu changes nightly offering Canadian specialties and regional wines. Seating is done communally, you’ll never have the same people twice in a row. Conversations start easily and by the second night you know who is going where, when and why. You will look forward to their return at breakfast.
After dinner the lounges stay open late. As night falls, the Skyline car can get the quietest on the train, with passengers enjoying a drink as they watch the sky darken behind the mountains. The train gently rocks through night, and the weird rocking feeling of the first night is the comfy rocking feeling of the third night.
The Days Blur Together
The truth about several days on the Canadian train is that time stops behaving normally. There is no such thing as hours, only meals and sunsets! Some passengers make the trip in stages, spending a night or two in Jasper or Winnipeg, but adding length to the itinerary and also some break the spell. Those who stay on board the whole way describe the experience as something closer to a retreat rather than a commute. There is no Wi-Fi and limited cell signal between cities and certainly no reason to rush anywhere. The train does the moving for you.
The Bottom Line
Life on The Canadian is slow and social and surprisingly restful. It is not a cruise, nor a hotel. It is a train, with all the small noises and narrow corridors that implies. But for four days, it offers something increasingly rare, uninterrupted time to watch a country pass by, one province at a time.