Rail tales to remember

Last week’s feature on trains prompted a great response; here are some of your experiences. Plus: why LA is cool for kids

Orient Express. Some carriages were equally crowded, but when we said we were for “The Rally” we were ushered to the dream section, reserved for the select few – though they were not bound for the same rally that we were. It was far more comfortable, so we kept shtum.

At the Romanian border Russians shouted: “Greetings of peace and freedom from our leader, Stalin”; everyone responded “Stalin”. The same followed for “Wilhelm Pieck” from the East Germans, and “Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej” from the Romanians. When our turn came, Gilbert raised his bowler and said: “Greetings from Sir Gordon Richards, an Englishman who leads in many fields.” They may not have known this fine English jockey, but they cheered. BARRINGTON BLACK

Bear necessities

There are great alternatives to the Rocky Mountaineer train in Canada, such as the Skeena (Train No 5 and No 6) which travels 721 miles (1,160km) in two days from the Pacific coast to the Canadian Rockies.

Most of the journey is through inaccessible forest wilderness speckled with lakes under towering mountains and alongside rushing rivers that have sculpted their own valleys.

We boarded the train in Prince Rupert with a double-decker domed observation coach and a rear club car where our knowledgeable guard/ barman/barista/guide greeted us. Among his duties was to tell us “the driver is slowing because there are bears ahead” and we were entranced to see a mother and two cubs stare at us before ambling into the woods. ROGER FARRALL

Mammoths in LA

I agree with Charlotte Pearson Methven (“Can LA win out as the tween American dream destination?”, June 3) that Los Angeles is a fantastic destination for children.

At the La Brea Tar Pits and museum in Hancock Park, central LA, you can learn about stars of the Pleistocene era. The museum houses thousands of animal skeletons, including mammoths, which came to drink at the watering holes formed on top of the deadly substance.

Visitors can watch palaeontologists in their glass-fronted laboratories recovering ice-age fossils from the still-bubbling tar. KEVIN MCKENNA