Rail Photos

Here's ex-GWR #5972 "Olton Hall" a.k.a. "Hogwarts Castle" pulling "The Wizard Express" into York after a run to Scarborough, taking advantage of the Harry Potter craze for all it's worth. In actual fact, not only is the story pure fantasy, but so is the paint scheme and name on "Olton Hall!" It's a Great Western Hall Class, not a Castle Class (Castles were 4-cylinder, while Halls were 2), and Great Western painted their locomotives Brunswick Green, not red!! Oh well, one would have to assume that everyone enjoyed themselves on this particular day.

It's a shame, in a way, that I was shooting my cross-processed roll when I took this photo, as the locomotive is quite rare nowadays. Built 1957-1960 by Skoda, these are some of the oldest locomotives still in regular service on Ceske Drahy, and in this case the loco was standing in, with a rake of Russian bi-levels, for a Class 451 or 452 EMU on a service to Benesov U Prahy.

This is a bridge over the Sazava River In Cercany, Bohemia, where the opportunities to shoot great train pictures seem ever-present. In reality, I've never got a good shot of a train here, in spite of frequently being there, the bridge having trains every 15-30 minutes, and it being perfectly legal to walk out on the bridge!! As they say on Monty Python "I got a slug," but actually this isn't a slug at all...even worse, it's a speeder!! :-) At least it's an interesting one with a built-in crane.

Class 451 and 452 EMUs are a necessary evil of travelling on Ceske Drahy. They're noisy, old, dirty, slow, rough-running, heavily vandalised, and laughably out of date, but they're often the only trains working the line you need to travel, and they rarely break down, actually. Here Ceske Drahy #452 013-6, a 452 Class EMU, waits to work a local service to Benesov U Prahy.

This was more or less certainly not taken in 2000, as I have no record of any trips to York in 2000, so the copyright date is wrong. It's probably like that because I had this photo in with my 2000-2001 darkroom stuff. I do I recall taking it while I was on a research trip to York, after going there had become routine but before I actually started living there (2002-2004).

I took this at the National Railway Museum of Britain in York, and the locomotive is the very first of the famous LMS "Black Five" 5P5F Class 4-6-0s. Although some others had lower numbers, like 4767 downloaded right before this, the first Black Five does nevertheless carry the number 5000. Here it's displayed coupled to a period version of the Royal Train, as it would be configured to pull it.

I took this shot at Holt station on the North Norfolk Railway, along with a roll of other black and whites that I took that day. This was my second visit to the North Norfolk Railway, which was done precisely to shoot photos, and in particular black and whites.

Here's...another F40PH!! :-) This one is departing Plattsburgh, southbound with Train 68.

This is one of my only, and perhaps my only, good shot of an F40PH taken from above. This was a southbound, which could only be train 68, the "Adirondack" for New York Penn. It's slowing for Plattsburgh station, which is in the distance, around the curve and on the right side of the tracks.

I took a lot of photos of Amtrak trains coming in and out of Plattsburgh when I studied there. This is one of my favorites, of an F40PH with some kind of wreck damage on the nose.

This was my train, a Nacht Zug, or Couchette, which had just got me into Berlin in the extreme early morning hours, hence the darkness. These Class 120 electrics aren't monstrously fast, but they're powerful, versatile, and enough.

Here's a shot of some of the 2nd-generation Thalys trainsets, which have TGV Duplex (3rd Generation TGV) power units (locomotives). The coaching stock is more or less 2nd Generation single-level TGV, though, not Duplex. I like the old ones better. :-)

Jumping way ahead to my trip back to Prague, this was when I had to spend a few hours waiting for my connection in Brussels. I also took photos of the city, of course, but first...the trains!! :-) At least, this was the most interesting one, I thought. This is a Thalys TGV high-speed train, essentially a 2nd Generation SNCF TGV, but with multi-current capability for operating into Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany. As with other international European trains, the Thalys is operated by a crew from the country it is currently in, switching at the border. These are used a lot by American tourists, at least if they've still heard of train travel, because they offer a faster form of international transport than the plane or the car. Also, if you have a Eurail pass (I didn't), it's often cheaper than flying, although a surcharge is added because the Thalys is, indeed, a true high speed train capable of running at 300Km/h (186 m.p.h.). This one looks to have its coupler exposed for running with another set, although I didn't see the other set around.

Jumping way ahead in my trip, since I took few photographs during the night, this is after I arrived in London Paddington, after having arrived in Brussels, changed to the Eurostar, arrived at London Waterloo, and taken the Underground to Paddington. At this point, I finally had enough light, in other words, to shoot handheld. I've always loved the way the trains at Paddington, which are nearly always high performance in looks as well as reality, look so great when lined up and read to go! :-)

Built by Siemens, the 402 Class ICE high speed trains were the second production variant of the ICE, introduced in the mid-1990s. They were smaller and slower than the original 401 Class (250 Km/h instead of 280), but they offered better safety, and their shorter length allowed them to handle more minor routes. In this case, though, it doesn't look to have worked, as two sets had to be coupled together.

After I arrived in Berlin, there wasn't much to do for a few hours, so I walked around taking photos before getting the next train #NZ242 for Bruxelles-Midi, at 2146. Berlin Hbf was recently restored and rebuilt massively, and bears little resemblence at this point to the steam-era station. It's as much mall as station, like Washington Union, Cleveland Union Terminal (but with more trains), London Liverpool Street, or London Waterloo in this respect. The food isn't too bad, and the shopping is so-so. I didn't find anything worth buying.

This is the 1434 departure that I was going to take to Berlin, on the first leg of my journey to Cardiff. The train's number was EC172, and was a named Eurocity, "Vindobona." Because it originated in the south, it had a Zeleznicna Spolecnost, or Slovak Railways, Class 350 electric locomotive on the point. In reality, though, it's being worked by a Ceske Drahy crew, and of course is using CD rails. :-)

As you can see, I caught up to the Pendolino, again at Holesovice, although I still didn't get a chance to ride it. It was going in the wrong direction for me. :-( Still, I like this photo, and I hope that you do too.