Day 71 - Murder on the Orient Express

Middle of the week and a matinee! Ange and I got up early to get our day's work done so we could leave for Evesham and the Regal Cinema's showing of the new remake of Murder on the Orient Express. As most people know, it is based on the Agatha Christie murder mystery. But what do we know about the Orient Express. Well, the Orient Express was a long-distance train service that began running in 1883 and was only seen as an international train service that ran from Paris to Istanbul (although it only went directly to Istanbul in 1889). Over time it became synonymous with luxury travel and, as a result of the book, mystery. 

With interest declining, the route was shortened in 1977 so that the train no longer went as far as Istanbul and stopped instead at Bucharest, Romania. In the 90s the route ran only between Paris and Budapest, and by the 2000s the route was shortened again to Vienna. In 2007 the Orient Express stopped departing from Paris and instead ran between Strasbourg and Vienna. By 2009 the service was stopped altogether. Of course over those decades the older version was replaced by modern trains with overnight accommodation facilities.

The Orient Express has played many a role in film. The train appears in the four versions of the Murder on the Orient Express (1974, 2001, 2010 and 2017), the 1963 James Bond flick, From Russia with Love, and the 2004 version of Around the World in 80 Days. A first edition of the book was published in 1934 and you can get a copy for 2,750 British Pounds.

Believe it or not, there was a luxury tourist operation called the Venice-Simplon Orient Express which was started by an American investor who had purchased and refurbished some of the original passenger cars from the Orient Express and began a London to Venice service in 1982,which means it had been competing with the traditional Orient Express, albeit with the goal of targeting well to do customers. This luxury service still runs today, and if you would like to go on that journey it will only cost you $10,000 per person for the overnight trip in a grand suite. A bargain! If you want to take a combination of high speed/regular trains that takes you along a similar route you can save yourself $9,750 per person -- but none of the luxury frills!

Ale of the Day: S.B.A., Donnington Brewery, Stow-on-the-Wold, Gloucestershire