I make the trip to Melbourne and back once a year on the sleeper and I have mixed feelings. I love the idea of going to sleep at night and waking up in Melbourne. The trip is perfectly timed, ie. you get off work, home / shower and back to Central for the evening departure, then in Melbourne before the day starts. That is all of the good bits. The not so good bits, the train is old so trying to go to sleep on it is near impossible, it creaks, it rattles continuously in ways you cant fix, the blinds hardly ever shut completely, the toilet/shower between the two cabins has never been upgraded since 1983 and the cabin service seems poor value.

The complimentary meal is a packet of 3 crackers with tomato relish, a small pack of savory sticks and a small cup of water. Breakfast since COVID is cereal and a cup of tea/coffee (before COVID you could choose toast). While I am sure the sleeper service is more comfy than sitting up, it is generally just sad / old train that will probably be in service for another 20 years.

Also, you aren't meant to use the power sockets in the sleeper carriage for anything other than a shaver. Once again, hasn't been upgraded since 1983 so the power is not very stable for electronic devices.

I am not sad they are stopping the sleeper, but I will just fly from now on.

The old SEx/MEx sleeper service was better than the XPT ever was. You had the full deluxe cabins if you wanted it with families, a proper dining car, and the slower travel time actually made more sense for overnight.

The problem with the XPT is that it's always been a weird middle ground. It's not a high speed train or anything close, it's just a bit faster, and the road these days is in a state where it's a reasonably ok one day drive if you've reason not to fly.

I wish we had more trains here in the US. I would love to take a train from my location (major city in SE) to basically anywhere, but it isn’t possible because we had no train service…at all.

I got a bus + sleeper from the Gold Coast to Sydney last year, loved it. Bed was fine, was cool having my own little cabin. The shower was adequate, kinda cramped but the temperature was good. Breakfast was proper food, unlike someone else's description of the Syd-Mel. The electricity was a bit weak as I recall, just made my laptop drain a bit slower.

Going in the other direction during the day was absolutely lovely, a much nicer experience than flying. Got to see so much scenery and felt very relaxed...until the bus ride.

It was not much cheaper than flying and I only did it because I care about carbon emissions. Would be nice for the environment if they could bring the cost down - when NSW did free trips they included the XPTs and they were booked out, so people are obviously willing to use them if the price is low enough.

Or just carbon tax the fuck out of air travel 😈

I suspect part of the rationale is that if you’re doing the 11-hour journey propped up in a seat, you can pretend you’re flying to Dubai or somewhere glamorous like that.

Where are sleeper. Trains Making a comeback and how to find them? (in Europe? )