Caravanistan

All international trains from and to China have been cancelled in early 2020 due to Covid-19 and not yet been reinstated. I expect at least a handful of them to resume soon (likely trains to Laos, Vietnam and maybe Mongolia, I do not expect the direct train Moscow-Beijing to restart any time soon). ...

I think Turkey's Dogu-Express will be gone for some time due to the devastating earthquake. No - Dogu Express runs through north-eastern Turkey, the earthquake has hit south-eastern Turkey. The Turistik Dogu Express (a train aimed at [mainly domestic] tourists with comfortable sleeping cars) has be...

Often, such trains are available for advance ticket purchase only for journeys starting in the country of departure (Russia). Free places will become available for purchase from Beineu later (maybe 48/24 hours before departure, maybe as soon as the train has left Volgograd, maybe as soon as it has c...

All long-distance trains in Uzbekistan should have a dining car. There is always a small risk that you won't get food though (dining car broken, cook ill, ...). I'm not sure about the Kazakh train from Aktau to Beineu.

The train you're referring to used to run from Lahore to Atari (with onward connections to Amritsar and Delhi). It was withdrawn in 2020 due to Covid-19 and has not been reinstated yet.

The border may or may not be closed for locals, but is certainly closed for tourists. The lookout is generally bad, the situation in Abkhazia has been deteriorating quite a bit in the past years. There are now power outages for multiple hours a day due to uncontrolled cryptocurrency mining(!). Energ...

AFAIK, there was a gauge change (with passengers remaining on the train) at the border. Many night train carriages from Soviet times have gauges that can be changed, so I assume that Azerbaijan Railways have them as well.

Hmmm. Thanks for reporting. I can still find ДУШАНБЕ, really weird.

I could find it easily on Uzbek Railways website. Keep in mind that it runs only weekly, leaving Tashkent every Tuesday.

I found a Tajik news report (in Russian) saying the train has a restaurant car ("вагон ресторан"). I'd assume that it's correct, although I would still bring some instant noodles to prepare with the samovar so that you don't go hungry in case there is a problem (e.g. restaurant car broken, cook ill,...