Dhaka and Chittagong are the two biggest cities in Bangladesh, and there are several trains a day connecting the cities. It’s a far better option than the bus, so plan ahead if you are travelling between the two.

I was originally looking for an agent to buy a ticket for me but my hotel was of little assistance, and I didn’t see any travel agents in my wanders. You can buy tickets online if you have a local mobile phone number. I had opted not to get a sim card as I wanted to go offline for a while. If I had known about this I would have got a sim card.

I went old-school and lined up for a ticket myself. I went two days before as I read the train sells out in advance. I waited 45 minutes in the queue to get a ticket. The ticket agent didn’t speak English but I had the train number and date of travel written down in anticipation. The daily train details are written on a big board in the ticket hall.

My ticket was 656 Bangladeshi Taka ($7.94 USD). I got the Mohanagar Provati (inter city) [704] which had the most civilised travel hours. It departs at 7.45am and arrives at 1.50pm, making it a (supposedly) 6 hour 5 minute trip.

I arrived early to get something to eat and make sure my I got the right train.

One thing I didn’t count on was that the platform information had the train numbers in Bengali numerals. I didn’t even know that was a thing, so I stood at the platform entrance trying to decipher which train was mine.

As it turns out I was the only foreigner at the station so I was standing out like a sore thumb. A young man saw me looking lost and came to my assistance. He had studied in Australia so he was just as pleased to see me as I was of him. He walked me to my train and found the right carriage.

The train departed on time so that was a good start. Travelling through the urban heart of Dhaka is a sight in itself, with markets and slums built right up along the train line.

Once the train had got out of Dhaka a man came through serving breakfast boxes. I wasn’t sure if this was part of the ticket (as it is on some trains in India and Thailand). I took a box anyway just to see.

The box had a fried skinny chicken leg, a Bengali spiced vegetable cake, and two pieces of plain white bread.

A tea and coffee service also comes through, which is an amazing sight to watch as the drinks are served in crockery.

The breakfast was 90 BDT ($1.09 USD) and the coffee 20 BDT ($0.24 USD).

The good news is that there is a western toilet available. The bad news is that the floor was sloshing with bog water.

The seats were comfortable and the cabin temperature was just right. I was comfortable in jeans and t-shirt .

The train was about an hour later by the time it got to Chittagong. I was expecting a delay so overall I was pleased to be able to take this instead of a bus.

Read more train reviews in the train travel section.

Cox’s Bazar is the pride and joy of Bangladeshis. Everywhere I went people would always say to visit their famous beach. I had already planned my Bangladesh trip to end at Cox’s Bazar, and after being in the big cities I was looking forward to filling my lungs with sea air for a few days.

Even before I knew anything about Cox’s Bazar I was intrigued to visit. It seemed, bizarre that a place in Bangladesh would still have a colonial-era name, of a person no less.

Cox’s Bazar is the name of the city, the surrounding district, and the name of what is the longest unbroken length of beach in the world. I’ve read it’s between 120 to 155km. Whatever its length, it’s a big-ass beach.

At the top end of the beach is the city of Cox’s Bazar, which is where the airport and most of the hotels are. The first thing I did after I had checked in was to get a glimpse of this legendary beach. It’s a wide and sandy beach in front of the hotel area. The water colour is more of a “Bay of Bengal Brown”, as I liked to call it.

When I was booking a hotel I was having a hard time finding any decent rooms. It turns out I was there during a national holiday, so the beach was even more crowded than usual. At times the beach resembled a waddle of penguins. I imagined that if an alien spaceship came to earth they might come here to study our species, just as we head to Antarctica to study Emperor Penguins.

It seemed like half of Bangladesh was here, and like my experience in Chittagong I was swamped with selfie requests.

When I go to the beach I usually spend my time walking along the waters edge, which is what most people were doing here. It seems like I have found my beach people.

The good thing about Cox’s Bazar is that most of the development is centred on one area. You only have to walk a kilometre and the crowd thins out fast. By then you end up in beach cricket territory.

And beyond there it thins out to the point where you have the beach to yourself. I had considered renting a bike and going out to explore more of the coastline, but I was perfectly content with just walking a few kilometres away from the hotel zone. Part of me wanted to see every kilometre of this beach, as if to confirm that it is indeed the longest beach in the world. Then I realised that as long as I get a bit of solitude on this stretch of beach I don’t need to see it all.

Most of the activity beyond the hotels are fishermen. Look out for these charming little fishing boats.

Cox’s Bazar is near the Myanmar border, though crossing has been closed for foreigners for years. One thing that was disturbing about being here was knowing that not far from here are refugee camps, where life is not a day at the beach. Over half a million Rohingya refugees have poured in from neighbouring Myanmar into Cox’s Bazar District.

As with Dhaka and Chittagong, there are very few signs of the globalised world in Cox’s Bazar. On the main beach road a KFC stands alone as the only internationally recognisable brand.

Why eat at KFC though when you can get a curry with a freshly-made paratha bread.

At this point of my trip I was hoping to find some more cafes. I found one cafe that served espresso coffee and was suitable to do some work in.

Another good cafe is Mermaid cafe, which is a popular expat cafe by the beach. I saw more foreigners at these two cafes than in all of a week of travel in Bangladesh. My guess that most of the foreigners were working here, perhaps involved in the nearby refugee camps. I also saw the same three British guys walking along the beach at sunset every night.

Apart from the foreigners in their NGO 4WD’s there are very few international visitors here. The only flights here are from Dhaka and Chittagong and there is no indication of an international tourist market. While wandering around I soon realised there were no international currency exchanges. Usually beach resorts are awash with currency exchanges. With 163 million in the country, the domestic market is certainly large enough to sustain a tourism industry here.

There appears to have been a building boom several years ago which then came to a halt.

The most prominent building is the Radisson Blu project which is currently a concrete shell.

There is concern about over development, which the abandoned constructions sites stand as a monument to. On the other hand I would actually prefer it if they just developed the crap out of the city, and then left the rest of the beach as is. This would be better than having the 100+ kilometres of beach being over developed.

Before they go ahead and build more hotels, more work needs to be done on the basics. Rubbish is a big problem here, with people dumping rubbish in empty lots.

The back streets also have an abundance of rubbish.

And the back roads that serve hotels also need to be sealed.

One thing that surprised me was that electric tuk tuks are used here.

Given that Bangladesh is a conservative muslim country it’s always going to struggle to attract international visitors looking for a fun beach holiday.

That doesn’t mean though that it couldn’t become an international destination. If the roads and rubbished were fixed up, they could turn the city into a pleasant place to live. A good idea would be to have a long beach promenade, something like The Rambla in Montevideo. This walkway is 22km long and is an attraction in its own right. Cox’s Bazar is promoted as being the longest beach in the world, so why not offer an accessible (and environmentally friendly) way to experience it by having a broad walking and cycling path.

A train is planned from Chittagong to Cox’s Bazar, and before the Rohingya crisis there had been talk of a Bangladesh-Myanmar connection. My dream is to one day be able to get the train from Bangkok to India, so who knows, maybe I will be back here again in my lifetime via a train.

From the chaos of Dhaka I made my way to Chittagong on an easy 6-hour train ride. Even though it’s much smaller than Dhaka, it has all the same traffic and pollution problems of the capital. Stepping out of the train station I was greeted with a scene similar to that of which I had just left. I saw this bus and wondered if it really did go to where it says on the proverbial tin.

I did consider for a moment getting on the next bus to a nice city when my hotel booking fell through. The place I booked at didn’t have wifi, and the manager was kind enough to let me find another place without incurring a cancellation fee. I stood out the front and pondered if I should push on to the beach or stay. In the end I stayed, and I’m glad I did. Beyond the smoking piles of garbage there are some interesting things to see here.

I went to get lunch and it soon became apparent that being a foreigner in this city would be quite the oddity. After all the waiters introduced themselves the manager came out and had a chat as well. Selfies were taken, and I returned the photographic favour.

As with Dhaka, the city is filled with rickshaws.

Chittagong used to be an important trading port before the partition, so I figured there must be some remnants of that era to see.

I just walked towards the river hoping to find something, and I ended up stumbling upon Strand Road. As soon as I saw the name on the map I knew that it was going to be a special road.

Every city should plant trees like this.

It turned out that Strand Road is a treasure trove of historic buildings, most of which are in a dilapidated state.

Unfortunately pollution is a recurring theme here. This stream of black doom is on its way to the Bay of Bengal.

If this building was in Eastern Europe it would be a hipster ruin pub by now.

There are so many fixer uppers here that I hope someone does come and fix them up.

This road is a non-stop visual delight.

For the whole length of the Stand I had kids following me and saying hello, and workers stopped what they were doing to ask for a photo.

One guy followed me for a while filming me on his burner phone, so I filmed back. As you’ve probably gathered by now from the photos, the streets are a total sausage party.

All along the road are workshops that are servicing the maritime industry.

And some of the buildings are still habitable enough to run an office from.

This road is such an asset to the city yet there is no mention of it in any tourist guides that I read.

I finished my walk on the Strand thoroughly impressed with the amount of heritage buildings, and equally sad that they will be left to rot until there is no trace of them. Putting on my town planning hat, I exclaimed to myself “If I was in charge of this town I would move the maritime businesses and create incentives to restore the old buildings to a habitable state”.

Heading back inland there is another section of old Chittagong that is lined with beautiful big old trees.

This giant was my favourite.

The old railway station is in this part of town.

Opposite the station is the Bangladesh Railway Hospital.

Another colonial remnant is the Chittagong War Cemetery. I’m always drawn to the Commonwealth war graves for their history, and also just for being a well-kept park to walk through. The last one I visited was the Kanchanaburi War Cemetery.

I always go and say hello to the Australians who are buried here. It’s also interesting to see soldiers from other parts of the Commonwealth that you would not expect to see.

Aside from the last vestiges of colonialism, I just took delight in wandering around and observing every day life.

In any city there’s always something interesting to see, and I relished the feeling of being the only tourist in the town.

The combination of me walking everywhere and having a camera dangling around my neck meant that I got photo requests all day. My camera is a compact mirrorless that is quite beat up by now. I don’t feel self conscious about having it out all the time, and by having it out it invites more people photos.

One gentleman literally dragged me into his restaurant, where he invited me for lunch. I said I just ate but he was having none of it. He grabbed my arm and took me inside. He made me a coffee, got a waiter to run next door to buy an accompanying biscuit, and then got me a coke. He had worked abroad for decades in the gulf states before moving back to Chittagong, and he was happy to see a foreigner on his street.

When I left Dhaka airport I saw eight foreigners in Dhaka over three days. In Chittagong I saw one foreigner in my three days there. She was a German woman who was having breakfast with a tour guide, most likely on the way to somewhere else.

I first started thinking about this when I got off the train while I watched all the passengers stream out of the carriages. Chittagong is not a place that foreigners linger, but even so I still expected to see more tourists here as you do in India.

At one point I found the Radisson Blu, which stands alone as the only international-class hotel. It’s near the cricket ground and near a new convention centre that’s being built. If I had of timed my visit a few months earlier I could have seen Australia play here.

I considered dropping in there as I was getting desperate for a coffee, which would have increased my foreigner count if I did go there.

In the end I found what was probably the best coffee shop in Chittagong at Rio Coffee Corner.

Life here can be hard going. I watched this crew clean out a drain, clearing out the black muck by hand. There were boys in there up to their waist in toxic goo, which is just wrong.

And above all there is just dust everywhere. Sweeping is a never-ending activity here.

I sought refuge from the heat in any park I could find.

The few streets that have trees and wide footpaths really show what a more habitable city should look like.

I enjoyed my urban wanders and meeting all the kind people I met, but my lungs were ready to breath some sea air. Next stop was Cox’s Bazar.

Dhaka is one of the most densely populated cities in the world, and it’s famous for all the wrong reasons. It’s one of the most polluted, and it’s a regular on the lists of top 10 worst cities for traffic. It’s no surprise that it receives few visitors.

I knew that there had to be more to it than that, and as an avid urban explorer I was looking forward to visiting Dhaka to see what I could find. When I arrived I knew that I was going to love it.

First impressions

Initially it reminded me of India, which is not surprising as 71 years ago it was India. My first impression was “like India, without holy cows”. A more accurate description is that as Bengalis Dhaka has more in common with Kolkata, where Bengali is also the official language.

After checking in I went out for a walk to find something to eat and familiarise myself with the neighbourhood. I was staying near the old city, but I had no idea where I was. Once I started walking I was enticed by one side street after another.

I soon found a tea vendor which was to become a liquid staple during my visit. A cup of hot milky sugary tea is Tk10 ($0.12).

Points of interest in Dhaka

It soon became apparent that the city was too big to wander without some sort of plan. At the hotel they didn’t have any maps, nor did I find any maps anywhere in the city. Instead they were selling bootleg copies of the Bangladesh Lonely Planet. I rarely buy the copied version as the maps are terrible, so I do not endorse this if you are reading, good people of Lonely Planet. The book was years out of date, though that doesn’t matter when you are just reading it for the things to see and do. I also like the Lonely Planet for the condensed history at the start of the book.

I picked out all the recommended points of interest in the old city area and starred these in Google Maps. From my hotel I then had a path I could follow to these main points.

My first port of call was the Mausoleum Of Three Leaders.

From there I wound my way through the streets to the Dhakeshwari Mandir, which is the primary Hindu temple in Bangladesh.

I got to Lalbagh Fort, which was the only place I paid admission to enter. There was not much here, though the open garden space is a nice respite from the crowds. It was here that I realised that I just preferred to walk around the streets, drinking lots of tea on the way while meeting interesting people.

I still kept walking to each starred location to give me direction. It was the things that I saw on the way that made the trip. If there is a market I can’t help but walk through them.

And I find markets on the side of the road as interesting as any museum.

I like to find beauty where ever I go, such as this old tree standing by itself.

Or an old barber shop with hand-painted signs.

I always go to supermarkets and malls in foreign countries as well, as you never know what you will see. I stopped in at the only supermarket I found in my wanders, and saw a random live turkey for sale.

Old Dhaka

By now I was well and truly in deepest Old Dhaka. Here the roads become narrower and the traffic even more chaotic. The old city of Dhaka is truly a spectacle to see.

When I was booking accommodation I thought it would be wise to book in the old city to be close to the action. I couldn’t find anywhere to stay though, which turned out to be a good thing. There is no way you could stay in the old city without getting lost or losing your mind.

My highlights map included temples, mosques, and churches. I saw that there was an Armenian Church, which there always seems to be an Armenian church in far-flung Asian trading cities. Sure enough there is a web page dedicated to Armenian churches in Asia.

There are some old historic buildings here and there. Most of the interesting old buildings were covered in advertising and wiring, and too hard to get a photo. Like many other places in the world, Dhaka is struggling to save its historic buildings from developers.

I thought Bangkok and Saigon had a crazy wiring game. Mere amateurs compared this this city!

I knew that Dhaka had bad traffic, so I was braced for the worst when I arrived. Coming from the airport was like many other cities in Asia without a public transport system, but I got to my hotel with an hour.

The traffic of legend can be found in the narrow old city streets, where the traffic slows to a crawl.

Dhaka is filled with old cycle rickshaws, of which there are thousands on the road. Apparently there are 1.1 million rickshaws in the city, which I would have said was unbelievable if I had not been here myself.

Market goods in the old city are carried by rickshaw or balanced on top of heads.

If there is no traffic, people will fill in the space.

I would have guessed that I could have walked faster through the market streets past the rickshaws. At times though I found myself stuck in the traffic, unable to get past the jam of rickshaws parked wheel-to-wheel on the road.

Buriganga River

From the main artery of Mitford Road I eventually escaped the maze that is the old city and made my way to the riverfront. From the bridge the river appeared to be black, which thought was a trick of the light of the midday sun. No, this is a dead river that is black from pollution.

There is so much activity on the river that I could have spent a day just taking it all in. Bangladesh is a nation of rivers, and I left the riverbank realising that I won’t get to see a more natural representation of a Bangladesh river system on this trip.

The amateur town planner

On my first trip to India in 2007 I discovered that my calling for life should have been town planning. I’m too deep into the web business now to consider going back to school, so I’m more of an amateur town planner and infrastructurist. Like in India, road works here are often left half finished. A ditch is dug on the side of the road, and then a big pile of dirt is left behind. Dust is everywhere here, and shop keepers are seen continually sweeping the front of their store in a futile attempt to keep the dust down.

There is rubbish everywhere you go as well, often as giant piles of refuse.

This road won the award for the greatest feat of wiring I’ve ever seen.

Refuge in a green space

To escape the urban mayhem I visited Ramna Park, the green heart of Dhaka.

The park used to have a racecourse in it during the time of the British, which gives you an idea of the size of the park. There is a lake, plenty of trees, and wherever there is an open space you’ll most likely find a group playing cricket.

A time capsule of a city with no chain stores

One of the remarkable things about the old city is that there are no chains or famous brand shops. For better or worse I saw few international brands during my wanders. I know people bemoan Starbucks and McDonalds being everywhere, but it is usually a sign of prosperity. It turns out that that the international stores are in the newer northern suburbs of the city.

It was fascinating to walk around in the old part of a capital city and see no signs of the global retail world. I did did miss fuelling up on coffee though, and I also became acutely aware that if I needed to go to the toilet in I might be in trouble to find a convenient bathroom.

I also went to a mall in my visit, which was basically the same sort of shops that are in the old city bazaar, in a mall setting. This might the the future for traders if the powers that be decide to clear out parts of the old city. The mall had a few brands that made me look twice, such as JC Peney.

And a version of UNIQLO.

Future metro

The good news for the residents of Dhaka (and for the future prosperity of the city) is that a metro system is being built. The construction of the first metro line is visible when driving from the airport, though like the new Saigon metro the progress has been slow.

Is Dhaka safe?

I got asked if Dhaka is safe, and got comments saying that security was too much of an issue to consider going. I’m not your father, and I’m not a security expert, so now that disclaimer is out of the way I will say that I felt completely safe in the old city. I’ve felt more unsafe in American cities than in Dhaka. That is not to say there isn’t security issues here. My take is that the incidents you read about in the news tend to be of known foreigners in foreigner enclaves. My hotel had security staff with a metal detector, and the cinema and mall I went to also had metal detectors. I never felt threatened, and there is no hotel tout or other travel scam business here because there is no tourism. I felt more overwhelmed by the amount of selfie requests I got than anything else.

Where to stay in Dhaka

Seeing I was only here for a few days I figured I should stay close to Old Dhaka. I stayed at Hotel 71, which turned out to be ideal. It’s near the old city without being in it, it’s on a main road so it wasn’t a hassle for a taxi to get to from the airport, and it is near the main train station.

Another option is if you are flying in and out of Dhaka is to stay near the old city first, then end at Gulshan on the way out.

Gulshan is an well-to-do neighbourhood in the northern suburbs of Dhaka. It’s a residential area with shopping centres and international brands, and most of the embassies can be found here. I feel like I would of got a better representation of what living in Dhaka would be like if I went here. I even had a cafe marked out to visit, as there were literally no cafes in the old city.

Hotel Name: Asian SR Hotel
Address: 291 Station Road, Chittagong, Bangladesh

I stayed at Asian SR Hotel in Chittagong, Bangladesh. Originally I had booked another hotel, but when I arrived I found out there was no wifi so they let me cancel the booking. There is a row of hotels on Station Road, so I just walked to the next available one which was this one. The rate per night was 1725 Bangladeshi Taka ($20.80 USD).

The hotel is in a modern tower not far from the main train station.

I got a double room with private bathroom. My room didn’t have a window, which is not my ideal room situation. After a long day of travel I couldn’t be bothered looking for another room so I sucked it up. The watermelon wallpaper was a bit jarring to the eyes, but the bed was comfortable enough.

The room had a little desk and shelving, though no place to hang clothes.

The bathroom shower was a bucket shower, which you still encounter in travels across Asia. It had hot water at least, and the room was clean and tidy.

There is a breakfast service next to the reception area.

Breakfast is a Bangladeshi style meal of 2 curries and paratha bread (and tea).

There is free wifi throughout the hotel (which was why I moved here) and I had no problem connecting in my room.

Overall this was an ok place to stay. I probably could have done better by finding a room with a window, but it wasn’t bad enough to move.

Book the Asian SR Hotel online or search for more hotels in Chittagong.