I only know as much Spanish as the next anglo Californio, but I think that the joke is that ‘Ciudad’ was misspelled as ‘Cuidad’ - “caution.”
Oh man, I am getting old. I completely forgot about Juarez to Mexico City back when I was a young buck, and this reminded me. 36 hours one way. I was on my way to Nicaragua and had to meet up with some people in Mexico City. Then we flew to Managua from there. Then when it came time to return home, we reversed the process, split up in Mexico City, and I did the 36 hours back to Juarez again. And we’re talking sit-up seats, not a sleeper. The first night, ther Federales came through poking around people’s bags. One asked me for money, I pretended I didn’t understand, and he went away. There happened to be another American on the train who did have a sleeper, and I would chat with him on the station platforms whenever we pulled in somewhere. When he heard about the money request, he was surprised. He had quite a bit of experience in Mexico and said that sort of thing was more common among the lower orders of law enforcement and rare among Federales.
But the almost 12 hours from Beijing to Shanghai is still the wife’s record.
Longest time in one car was the three nights in the Amtrak sleeper that goes from LA to San Antonio on the Sunset Limited, then is switched to the Texas Eagle for the rest of the trip from from San Antonio to Chicago. Second place would go to the Moscow-Ostend sleeping car I took in 1991. It was attached to a series of trains from Moscow to Belgium. They even lifted up the car in Brest and changed the wheels from 5’ Soviet gauge to 4’ 8.5" standard gauge.
The longest trip ever was in January, Houston-LA-Portland- St. Paul. We left Houston on Monday evening and arrived in St. Paul on Saturday afternoon. Our last train was 8 hours late because of a freight derailment in Marias Pass in Montana. We decided that five nights on a train was about one night too many.
Winnipeg to Vancouver was the longest DISTANCE on a train. Noon central time on Saturday to 9 am pacific (11 am Central Time) on Monday. About 47 hours.
The longest time on the train was 56 hours between Thunder Bay ON and Montreal Quebec. Got on the train at midnight on Monday night. We sat in the station until 7 am. Then another few hours stopped in Nipigon. Somewhere on the train a water pipe froze then burst and some passengers from other cars moved into the car I was in. There was the dude behind me rewinding his casette tape with a pencil. I was never so happy to see anyone or anything as much as my weird co dwellers in my dorm. It was a horrible horrible ride.
Oh, there was also the Seattle to Minneapolis trip in 1993. I always kind of wonder if I sat next to the unabomber for part of that ride. But that’s a whole 'nother story.
I did it Sydney-Perth, late 70s. Wiki says 75 hours in 1970, now 65 hours.. so 70 hours approx, I guess.
Acela from NYC to/from Boston and NYC to/from Washington,DC. About 4 hours. I’ve also taken it NYC to/from Philly.
Given delays, security, getting to the airport, etc, it’s my preferred method for trips under 4-5 hours. Any longer I’m taking a plane.
Stockholm to Kiruna, 16 hours one way to catch the transit of Venus in June of last year. Total 32 hours, and it was a bascially pleasant experience.
Took the train overnight from St. Petersburg to Moscow on the way to Uzbekistan, but don’t remember how long it took. Slept like the dead, though.
Someday I do plan to ride the Trans-Siberian.