It ranks as Europe’s newest national rail system, started after World War Two and only completed in the mid 1980s, it is the most isolated and run down, and it must surely be the cheapest. Superlatives abound when it comes to talking about Hekurudha Shqipetare, or HSH, the national railway of Albania (“the land of the eagles”), so what is it really like, this system of 356 route kilometres (since reduced through closure), that could be covered in its entirely for a total fare of less than €10.00?
Setting out with the aim of travelling the entire network in five days was like taking a step back in time and into some parallel universe. Life on HSH is run at a sedate pace, survival of the whole system seemingly hanging by a thread, and where un-broken and fully glazed windows in carriages are something to be dreamed of, in a country where throwing stones at passing trains seems to be something of a national pastime. Continue reading “Albania’s forgotten railway”
Despite a long and bitter local campaign, the 30-mile long route from Rosslare Europort to Waterford, in the south eastern corner of the Irish Republic, was closed on Saturday, 18 September 2010 and now remains “mothballed”, with state rail operator Iarnród Éireann (IE) required to maintain the line, in the unlikely event of its future re-opening.
Corsica is probably best known for its liberation front and its wild boar pate, but the large Mediterranean island can also boast the finest and most spectacular narrow gauge railway system anywhere in Europe – at least since the sad closure a few years ago of Portugal’s Douro Valley routes from Tua to Mirandela and Regua to Villa Real.
Transcribing this diary a decade after the events it describes brings home just how dramatic have been the changes that have taken place in Poland over the last ten years. Far from the booming economy of today, Poland at Christmas 1990 was a country on the verge of huge changes. 