New Steam loco

From Very High-speed to classic rebuilt steam locos; the BBC has an exclusive look at the UK’s newest steam loco. Called the Tornado, it has been built by volunteers from scratch at a cost of 3 million GBP. 18 years of planning and construction and it is now in full steam, the only one of its kind. Fabulous. I do like the gray paint job though, pity it has to be painted in LNER colours

• BBC News
• A1 Steam Loco Trust
• Peppercorn Class A1

Ffestiniog Railway

Spent a week overlooking Porthmadog Harbour station. There were only two trains last week (Wed and Thu) which for the middle of November were quite full. The best thing was, other than being right opposite the railway, that they were running double-headers in the morning We had one sunny day so half the photos are with good light, the others are made more interesting (when taking the photos) with being grey and overcast.

• Railway Photos of the World

Michael Palin’s trip round Europe

If you can watch BBC TV, unlike me, then you can watch another of Palin’s journeys round somewhere. The trip to Poland looks good…

clipped from travel.timesonline.co.uk One of the great experiences of the trip was in Poznan, Poland, where they let me drive a steam train. This is something that would never, ever happen in this country. They allow someone who has never driven before – the most I’ve done is stand on the footplate – take a commercial service with passengers on board through the forests at 50mph

You can find more information about the ‘Wolsztyn Experience’ via an interesting article on Railroad.net

Emperor’s Train

Prague received a visit from the Emperor’s train last week. This train is a complete replica of the train built for Emperor Franz Josef in 1891. The Majestic Imperator can be hired for anyone wanting to experience the hight of luxury train travel. One interesting point was the fact that whilst the train was built for an Emperor one of the original coaches was used by the Czechoslovak presidents, a real case of everyone is equal but some are more equal than others.

• Prague Radio
• Majestic Imperator

Disused Stations

Disused Stations is an ever growing collection of stations in the UK that are no longer in use. In fact this site is quite something, there has been a great deal of effort put into this site and the list of disused stations seems to increase by the week.

I am sure there are other sites like this for various parts of the world. Fabulous, this is worth a visit if just to appreciate the work that has gone into it.

• Disused Stations

Pacifik

A few links relating to the same railway route, "Pacifik", and an article from Prague Radio…

"In its entirety the ’Pacifik’ is 157 kilometers long. It’s an amazing route. There are cliffs, viaducts, tunnels. Parts of the route were built in four stages and the area we’re at now is 110 years old. Some of the most impressive areas are in the area of Davle, not far from Prague. There is a gorgeous cliff face there known as Pikovicky Komin. In Davle the route climbs up from river-level up into the cliffs and there’s really a beautiful view."

[Prague Radio]

• Pacifikem - Czech website
• Posazavsky Pacifik - Enthusiasts site, with photo gallery

Thanks David