Algiers to Touggourt

Algeria's railway to the oases of the northern Sahara leaves the Algiers–Constantine main line at Bordj Bou Arreridj, crosses the Hodna basin to the foot of the Aurès, and drops through the gorge of El Kantara — the "golden gate" of the painter Eugène Fromentin — to Biskra and the palm groves of the Oued Righ. It ends at Touggourt, 417 kilometres down the line from El Guerrah, south of Constantine, where it began in 1882.

One train works it from the capital: SNTF's night express from Algiers Agha, with seats in both classes and couchettes, three nights a week. It leaves at 18:13 and is in Touggourt at 05:00, so the southbound run is a night in the dark. The northbound train is the one to watch from: it leaves Touggourt at 17:30, and on a long evening it runs up the oases and into the gorge in the last of the light.

The train leaves Algiers Agha eastbound on the line to Constantine, through Thénia, the Isser gorges and the Portes de Fer, and reaches Bordj Bou Arreridj at 22:06. There it turns south onto the newer railway of the High Plateaus: 55 kilometres to M'Sila, reached at 22:56, then 145 kilometres across the Hodna, the great basin around the salt flat of the Chott el Hodna, with Barika at 00:34. This line opened in 2011, and it saves the Saharan trains the long way round by El Guerrah and Batna.

Into the Aurès

South of Aïn Touta, at 925 metres the highest point of the Hodna line, the train joins the old railway from El Guerrah and runs down into the western Aurès. At El Kantara, reached at 01:57, the line squeezes through the gorge on the flank of the cliff, in a run of short tunnels and arched galleries above the river and the old bridge that gave the place its name — el kantara, the bridge. Below the gorge the palm groves begin.

The Ziban and the Oued Righ

Biskra, the "Queen of the Ziban", is at 02:56. Beyond it the railway was built separately, as a metre-gauge line of the Territoires du Sud opened in 1914 to carry the dates of the oases; it was rebuilt to standard gauge in 1958. It is flat and fast — trains reach 120 km/h — and crosses one large structure, the 300-metre bridge over the Oued Djeddi at Oumache. Then come the oases of the Oued Righ, a chain of palm groves and salt lakes running south: El Meghaier at 04:02, Djamaa at 04:29 and Touggourt at 05:00.

The train

The service is a rapide de nuit: a loco-hauled night express of first- and second-class seats and couchettes. SNTF does not say which locomotives work it. The photograph at the top of this page shows an SNTF diesel unit under the snow of the Djurdjura between El Asnam and Bouira, on the stretch the train runs out of Algiers; no freely licensed photograph of the night train itself exists.

One night train runs between Algiers and Touggourt.

Algiers to Touggourt — train B25/26/27, Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays

Touggourt to Algiers — train B28/29/30: leaves Touggourt at 17:30, calls at El Kantara at 20:29, Barika at 21:50, M'Sila at 23:12 and Bordj Bou Arreridj at 00:17, and arrives at Algiers Agha at 04:51.

The southbound train takes 10 h 47 and the northbound 11 h 21. SNTF's timetable lists the northbound train as running every day, while the southbound runs three nights a week, so confirm the day of the return at the station before you plan on it.

As of November 2026, from SNTF's own timetable search. SNTF's site is sntf.dz (opens in a new tab); it could not be opened from outside Algeria while this page was written, and these times were read from its search engine through a third-party front end. Check them at the station before travelling.

Fares are set by SNTF and quoted in Algerian dinars. Algiers to Touggourt costs 2,005 in first class and 1,500 in second for a seat; Algiers to Biskra is 1,415 and 1,060, and Algiers to El Kantara 1,280 and 960. A couchette costs extra, and SNTF's timetable search does not show the supplement, so ask at the counter.

Buy at the station. SNTF takes reservations online for its main-line trains, but payment there is by Algerian CIB bank card, so for a visitor the counter at Agha is the practical way to buy — a day ahead if you want a couchette, since this is the only through train.

No rail pass covers Algeria. Interrail's One Country Passes stop at Türkiye and the European shore of the Mediterranean, no North African railway is in the network, and SNTF has no pass of its own for visitors, so every journey is an ordinary ticket.

Nothing is lost by that. First class from Algiers to Touggourt is 2,005 dinars for more than 730 kilometres, and no pass could pay for itself.

As of November 2026, from Interrail's own list of One Country Passes.

The southbound train passes everything below in the dark, so these are places to stop for: El Kantara and Biskra are both stations on the line, and Temacine is ten kilometres from Touggourt. They are listed from north to south, in the order the train meets them.

The train is the bed: seats in both classes and couchettes, eleven hours, overnight in each direction. Book the couchette at the counter in Algiers or Touggourt.

Biskra and Touggourt are both provincial capitals with hotels, but none we could find sells rooms through a website of its own; the booking sites list several in Biskra and a few in Touggourt. For a night in Algiers before the train, Agha station is in the city centre.

Ride north for the view. Southbound, the train is in the dark from Bordj Bou Arreridj to Touggourt. Northbound it leaves Touggourt at 17:30, so on a long evening the oases of the Oued Righ and the run to Biskra pass in daylight, and in midsummer the gorge at El Kantara comes at dusk.

Mind the season. Touggourt and Biskra are in the Sahara: summer days are very hot, and the desert is at its best from autumn to spring — when, in return, the northbound train runs into the dark sooner.

Break the journey. A single ticket for 200 kilometres or more stays valid for five days if you have it annotated at the station where you stop, so a day at El Kantara or Biskra need not cost a second fare. Confirm it at the counter when you buy.

Allow for delays. The timetable is a plan rather than a promise on a long single-track line. Do not build a tight onward connection on an arrival time.

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