Operator: CFR/CFM
Headcode: RN402 ‘Prietenia‘
Route: BUC-CHI
Class: Single Sleeper
Seat: C4, S36
Date: Thursday 8th January 2026
With my time in Bucharest coming to an end, I was back at Bucharesti-Nord ready to catch the final train on this Meander to Moldova. The third overnight sleeper train of the trip would take me north through Romania and across the border into Moldova, before reaching Chișinău some 13 and a half hours later. Whilst sleeper trains have become almost synonymous with my January trips, this one would be the first crossing outside the Schengen zone and with the border formalities that would come with it. All that was still to come, but first the train needed to arrive! If you want to check out the other posts from my Meander to Moldova, you can do here, here, here, here, here, here and here.
I was at the station a couple of hours before the train was due to depart and, with there being no lounge at Bucharesti-Nord, headed to the Carrefour supermarket to stock up on supplies before grabbing a meal at the Bistro Nord restaurant within the station. The departure board showed our service with the destination Chișinău/Kyiv about an hour before departure, with the platform finally being shown just over 10 minutes before we were due to leave. However, at the platform there was still no train, and with it eventually being backed in just five minutes before departure, my hopes of an on-time departure were fading fast. With no indication on the platform as to where the carriages would be, boarding was slightly chaotic, although thankfully signs and flags in the carriage windows made it very clear which portion was going to Molodva and Chișinău and which was going to Ukraine and Kyiv.
After a mad dash to find the correct carriage, I was onboard a few of minutes after the train had backed in, and at 1910, four minutes late, we departed Bucharesti-Nord. My first impression of the room was that it was pretty basic, although the beds already appeared to have more padding than those on the Budapest to Bucharest sleeper two nights earlier. In the room there was a pair of reading lights (one of which didn’t work), two light switches (one of which didn’t seem to do anything) and power sockets (which did work!), however there didn’t seem to be any bin or temperature controls. Of course, with the carriages being former soviet examples, there was no onboard Wifi.
Shortly after departure there was a passport and ticket check undertaken, although this was by railway staff rather than any border force, and after this the sleeper car attendant brought round towels and bedding. The rooms don’t have any ensuite facilities, so a trip to the toilet at the end of the carriage is required to utilise the sink, whilst the toilet itself has not been modernised and so drops straight onto the tracks. There was a couple of other places where the age of the carriages was quite clearly shown, including when I headed forward to the bar in the next carriage and felt I was taking my life into my own hands as the gangway between the coaches was uncovered and had snow on it!
The first stop of the journey came around 45 minutes after departure in the town of Ploiești. Here a triangular junction just to the south of the town allows trains from Bucharest to either call at Ploiești Vest and head onwards towards Basov or, as we did, call at Ploiești Sud and continue towards Iași. It was after our stop here that I headed to the bar and got a Moldovan Chișinău beer for 12 Lei (about £2), although I did seem to interrupt staff dinner time as they laid out what smelt like a delicious, shared meal on one of the tables. There did seem to be some limited food options available, but if you want anything substantial, I’d recommend picking up a picnic before boarding. Finishing my beer, I headed back to my room before the next stop at Mizil, where our four-minute delay had increased slightly to seven minutes.
Between Mizil and Buzau there was some very bumpy track and after our stop at the latter at 2113, I settled down for the night as I was expecting plenty of disturbance in the early hours. The sharp stop at Râmnica Sărat nearly through me out of bed, but I slept through the stop at Focșani before briefly waking up at Mărășești by which point we were running 22 minutes late. Sleeping through another couple of stops at Adjud and Bacău, I woke up at Roman just before 0100 needing to open the window as the central heating had warmed the room to sauna like temperatures. Some heavy movement as we left Iași just before 0300 woke me up again and I assumed this was the start of the shunting, although in the darkness it was hard to tell.
40 minutes later I was woken from my doze by the Romanian border control knocking on the door and by this point we were at Ungheni Prut, the very final station before the Eiffel Bridge and Prut River which are the border at this point. Our arrival into Ungheni was at 0437 and the Moldovan border control came round almost immediately, collecting up and taking away passports which was a bit unnerving. It was even more unnerving when we started moving again before my passport was returned, but it was a shunt movement along the yard as the shunters started the process of changing the wheels from standard gauge to Russian gauge. With my passport returned just after 0500, sleep was still not possible due to the ongoing shunting, and I was finally able to drift off again just as we departed Ungheni.
After another 90 minutes or so of dozing, I was awake again around 0700 just under an hour before the one intermediate Moldovan stop at Calarasi. Giving up on sleep, I tried to enjoy the views of Moldova as the sun began to rise, although this was a bit of struggle as the window was very dirty. Unfortunately, no breakfast is provided onboard, so there’s nothing to break up the journey and the pace through Moldova seemed to be quite slow going as the journey between Ungheni and Chișinău that took us over three hours, only takes two by road. To the northwest of Vatra we passed the Ghidighici reservoir, before passing the rail yard at Vatra itself. The small suburban station at Visternichen on marked our entry into northern outskirts of Chișinău and around 10 minutes later we pulled into Chișinău’s main station at 0904, 20 minutes late.
The wide, open train shed of Chișinău station gave me a good opportunity to grab a couple of photos and note that at some point overnight, presumably Ungheni, the Kyiv bound coaches had been detached to continue their journey east. As I headed into the deserted ticket hall to connect to the WiFi and book a taxi into the city centre, I had time to reflect on the journey into my 40th country. Whilst the coaches are extremely dated compared to some of the more modern rolling stock across Europe, the journey was a lot more comfortable than the previous sleeper I had travelled onboard. Heading towards Chișinău, the border stops and wheel exchange all happen between the horrible times of 0330 and 0530. From what I’m told, heading in the other direction, this all happens between 2000 and 2200, which would allow a decent night’s sleep before the earlier arrival time into Bucharest of 0638.
Ultimately the sleeper between Bucharest and Chișinău is an experience I wanted to complete but probably wouldn’t do again as it doesn’t really fit as an ‘enroute’ option to anywhere else and there are much easier ways to reach the Moldovan capital. However, if you want to experience the soviet coaches and having the wheels changed under you whilst onboard, I’d recommend doing the journey the other way, from Chișinău to Bucharest, allowing you to get some decent sleep after crossing into Romania.
Lounge 0*
Seat/Facilities 3*
Food 2*
Service 5*
Punctuality 3*
Overall Rating 13/25 (read about my rating system here!)
Flights & Times 