Category: Europe

Imagine one of Europe’s most scenic railway lines, almost 100 miles in length, where virtually all services are worked by vintage British-designed diesel locos from the 1960s hauling equally-aged passenger coaches, with the added bonus of a seasonal weekend historical train along part of the route.

It may sound too good to be true, but this is the Douro Line in Portugal (Linha do Douro) which runs inland from Porto along the north bank – later crossing to the south bank – of the Douro River, and until a few years ago linked up a handful of remarkable narrow gauge railways that ran north from the Douro Line up picturesque tributary river valleys.

Continue reading “Vintage British diesels in the spectacular Douro Valley”

Fancying a change from the steam action at Wolsztyn, my fascination for narrow gauge railways takes me on a day trip to a place called Pleszew, one hour south of Poznań Główny station by regional (KW) train and location for the only mixed narrow/standard gauge railway in Poland.

Here there is a 3km (1.9 mile) branch line that runs from Pleszew Wąsk. (narrow gauge), adjacent to the main line station, to Pleszew Miasto (Town) station, a line that has closed, then re-opened in recent years, was operated by 750mm locos and railcars, but now has its regular passenger services formed by ex-Czech Railways (CD) 4-wheel railcars.

Continue reading “A mixed-gauge curiosity in Central Poland”

Scheduled daily steam services have resumed at Wolsztyn in Western Poland after a pause in operations during late April to prepare for the annual and highly popular “parade” event on 3 May 2025.

But the current weekday round trip from Wolsztyn to Zbaszynek on the Berlin-Warsaw main line and a rather longer Saturday trip to Poznan and back will come to an end on 16 August 2025 when Wolsztyn depot’s one working main line loco will be stopped for repairs.

Continue reading “Springtime steam action at Wolsztyn”

Barring a last minute miracle, 31 August 2025 will see closure of a scenic 33km (21-mile) branch line in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region of Central France that runs from a junction station at Busseau sur Creuse, around 60 miles east of the city of Limoges, southwards to a small town called Felletin.

Line 25 in the TER Nouvelle-Aquitaine network currently sees two daily round trips, with weekday departures to Limoges-Bénédictins from Felletin at 06.23 and 16.42, and return services from the city at 13.06 and 17.10. But an end-to-end journey time of two hours is almost identical to the time it takes on a “Cars Regionaux” 204 bus and the bus fare is vastly cheaper than the train.

Continue reading “Death of a French branch line”

Being the last place in the world to operate scheduled standard gauge steam passenger services has not prevented a tourism crisis in Wolsztyn, the attractive town in Western Poland that until mid-2023 was home of the Wolsztyn Experience (WE) and its world-renowned footplate experience courses.

During the 25 years WE operated (1998-2023) countless thousands of overseas visitors flocked to Wolsztyn, but its closure following the death in June 2023 of  founder Howard Jones MBE has led to the current crisis facing the town and its devastating impact on local businesses.

Continue reading “Tourism crisis hits Wolsztyn”

For all the rail trips I do around the UK and have done in Continental Europe, there is something totally compelling about Bulgaria’s only narrow gauge railway, which persuades me to return for the third consecutive year to Velingrad “Spa Capital of the Balkans”.

Velingrad stands roughly one-third of the way along the remarkable 78-mile (125km) long 760mm gauge railway that runs from a junction called Septemvri on the main rail route from Sofia to Plovdiv, all the way to the renowned ski resort of Bansko and its terminus at Dobrinishte a few miles further on.

Continue reading “Autumn colours in the Rhodope Mountains”

After a fascinating visit in November 2023 to the last narrow gauge line to be run by Hungary’s state railway operator, I am making return visit to the country to travel and photograph the country’s longest surviving 760mm gauge forestry railway network.

This is a 109km (68-mile) long system in the south-west of Hungary near the border with Slovenia that begins in a small town called Lenti before heading east to its base at Csömödér and then south to a terminus at a remote spot called Kistolmács.

Continue reading “Hungary’s longest narrow gauge railway system”

Two years after my last visit (Back in the DDR–August 2022) it is time to spend another few days travelling and photographing the finest steam-worked railway network in the world, the remarkable Harzer Schmalspur Bahnen (HSB) metre-gauge system in eastern Germany.

This time using a three-day “short holiday” (Kurzer Urlaub) network pass (€47.00/£40.50) my aim was to travel as much of the 140km/87-mile system as possible, with a mixture of steam haulage and travel in ageing diesel railcars.

Continue reading “More Harz delights”

A significant change has been made to daily steam services from Wolsztyn depot in western Poland since my October 2023 visit, with the two weekday workings to and from Leszno replaced in December 2023 by a single afternoon round trip each day to the junction station of Zbaszynek on the Berlin-Warsaw main line.

Gone, for now at least, are services like the 06.03 steam-hauled school train to Leszno, whose two coaches would be rammed by the time it completed its 46km (29-mile) run, and in its place is a 28km (17½-mile) service departing Wolsztyn at 14.14 on Mondays to Fridays and returning two hours later at 16.16.

Continue reading “A new direction for Wolsztyn steam”

Return visits earlier in the year to travel the only state-run narrow gauge railways in Bulgaria (June 2023) and Czechia (August 2023) had given me a taste for obscure little railways in Eastern Europe, so the lure of cheap flights takes me for a first time trip to see and travel the only narrow gauge railway run by Hungarian state operator MÁV.

This is a 22km (14-mile) 760mm (Bosnian gauge) system that runs inland from a resort on Lake Balaton called Balatonfenyves, a two-hour Inter-City train ride south-west from Budapest. It comprises a 14km (9-mile) route from the narrow gauge station at Balatonfenyves to a place called Somogyszentpál and an 8km (5-mile) branch from a junction called Imremajor to Csisztafüdo, a renowned thermal spa.

Continue reading “A Hungarian narrow gauge delight”