Train to Nanjing

One of the things I like to do in China is to take a train, the high speed G train (高速动车组列车, Gāosù dòngchē, or simply Gāotie). I took one such from Wuhan to Nanjing and back. Amazingly, the train sustained a speed of 247 Kilometers an hour for a substantial portion of its 500 plus kilometer route. The result is that the two and a half hour run easily beats a car or a plane for its convenience. From the first time I took a Gao train, I’ve been impressed by its stability: a bottle of water set on a table in front of you barely has ripples on its surface.

In the early 90s, when China started developing its own high speed trains, the average speeds of Chinese trains were 48 Kilometers an hour; as a result cars and flights had begun to carry larger fractions of long-distance traffic. But now, with the fast trains, everything’s changed. There are no direct flights between Wuhan and Nanjing, for example. With over two thirds of the world’s fast trains, Gaotie is China’s contribution to green travel.

In keeping with this marvelous achievement, the new train stations are monumental (see the entrance to the Nanjing South station in the photo above). Since I planned my travel to maximize my time in Nanjing, I found it very convenient to find a marketplace inside the station where I could buy dinner before getting on to the train.