Oriënt Express WR2287

This restaurant car is one of the many wooden carriages Wagon-Lits ordered made for international service, including the renowned Orient Express (Paris-Istanbul). Restaurant cars made it possible to travel long distances without stopping for meals. They made voyages by train quite a bit faster! The restaurant car has coal-fired central heating, a kitchen with a coal-burning stove, iceboxes and all manner of kitchen implements. The dining room has two and four-person tables and seats a total of 36. The armistice that ended the First World War in 1918 was signed in a carriage from this series, as was France’s capitulation to Germany in 1940. Coach 2287 operated primarily in Southeastern Europe and arrived at the Railway Museum in 1977. While the museum initially intended to use the coach as a restaurant, after a thorough restoration in Hungary, it was given a prominent place in the collection instead.