Among
transportation lines connecting Dalat to its neighborhood lasted for
some time the railway between Dalat and Chàm Tower, which was opened in
1938 and whose station of Dalat was considered the most beautiful
Indochina railway station at that time.
This 84 km railway, 16 km of which is rack and pinion railway, was
designed by Swedish engineers, experienced in mountainous geography,
allowed steamer engines and its passengers to climb up and down steep
hills or through dark tunnels, which provoked in them interesting
adventurous feelings of admiring slowly passing landscapes of majestic
mountains and forests. Unfortunately wartime caused part of the line
unsecured and the whole extraordinary line was left unused for a long
time.
In 1991, in an effort to produce various tourist products in
Dalat, the 7-km railway line joining Dalat with Trại Mát was restored
at a cost of over VND 11 billion. In fact, it hasn’t been so far
confirmed what kind of tourism it is in Trại Mát. Expect for that
tourists may visit Linh Phước Pagoda nearby, which is still restrictive
due to difficulty in travel and time limit.
In spite of the negative
side of this tour, impressively named ‘the excursion to Trại Mát’,
tourists can take the advantage of having a full sight of Dalat from
high above, when the train is winding its way along hill sides, of
admiring the continual miraculous changing of the nature in front of
their eyes, of enjoying the purest atmosphere of the Highlands, where
the pressure of industrial development can’t reach its hand for
environment pollution.