Deccan Odyssey by Robert Such

I first took my look around India’s new luxury train a few days after it had arrived from the Integral Coach Company factory in Chennai (Madras). At the end of its maiden voyage across the Indian subcontinent, the fresh woody smell of parquet in the Deccan Odyssey’s Spa Plumeria carriage was still strong. A range of spa, sauna and beauty parlour treatments will relax passengers’ minds and bodies as the midnight-blue and gold train rolls across the Maharasthran and Goan landscape. A small permanent staff will take reservations for manicures, pedicures and Swedish massages.

In the wall-to-wall carpeted Samvad (Hindi for ‘discussion’ or ‘dialogue’) carriage, business travellers will be able to hold meetings and surf the Net. A noticeable design flaw, however, is the absence of a partition between the long meeting table and the passage. Won’t passersby, walking from the sauna to their suites, continually distract people engaged in ‘samvad’?

Sturdy teak-panelled sliding doors conceal the suites, comprising a bedroom, a salon, and a bathroom.

At an average speed of 75 kph, the Deccan Odyssey starts its seven-day journey in Mumbai (Bombay). Stops include Aurangabad and the Ellora caves, the Ajanta caves, Ganpatipule, Ratnagiri, Sindhudurg, Goa and Pune. One day aboard will cost $350, or 17,000 rupees. A seamless journey will replace “14 to 20 days of backbreaking travel,” said Anish Kumar Singh, Managing Director of the Maharasthra Tourism Development Corporation, which is undertaking the project as a joint venture with the Indian Railways company.

Design-wise the Deccan Odyssey interior is simple, modern and comfortable. However, my initial enthusiasm diminished on seeing mass-produced woodcarvings glued to the panelling in the two restaurant carriages – Peshwa I and II – and examples of poor workmanship throughout the train. I had been expecting to be seduced by a non-standard interior – something more lavish, ornate and opulent. I had had visions of the Orient Express.

And while walking the length of the train, the passageways also felt rather cramped. At 67 cm wide, they may be standard, but they did seem too narrow. They were only wide enough for one person to walk down comfortably. Lots of space is usually a given in a top-notch classic hotel, so in this respect the Deccan Odyssey fails to make the class.