News and Updates
After two years of extensive scouting and planning, RailsNW has just launched our South Pacific program, featuring the finest trains in Australia and New Zealand. Traveling down under has never been easier! Initially, our sites will focus primarily on rail only information and reservations, with independent tour packages being added as quickly as possible. With thousands of miles of tracks throughout the region, there is no better way to experience the land "Down Under" than by train. Each month, we will highlight one of the extraordinary rail journeys of the South Pacific. We begin with one legendary train, over 70 years in the making.

The Ghan: Onboard the Great Southern Railway
When the Ghan Railway first departed from Adelaide to Alice Springs in 1927, service was intended to eventually span all the way to the northern city of Darwin. While the tracks did not span all the way to Darwin until February of 2004, the 70 years of passenger service running from Adelaide to Alice Springs was nothing short of legendary; the over 1000 kilometers of track between the two towns are the straightest anywhere in the world. The predictability of the unswerving path is in no way, however, indicative of the terrain through which the Ghan travels. A simple glance outside the window might afford a spectacular view of an arid mountain range, a remote salt lake, a kangaroo hopping alongside the train, or sheer red rock masses rising from the orange earth.