Atlantic Rail in Glencairn

[allanroy]

Atlantic Rail arrived at Glencairn station today. What a great sight and the number of cars that stopped along the road to take photos was amazing.

[John Ashworth]

Amazing pictures. Well done to all of you!

[hansieswart]

Hallo Luca, (and Stefan and Dylan)

As promised earlier today, I would like to congratulate you on a most enjoyable trip. Everything was well-run, on time, professional and all representatives of FOAR were extremely helpful and friendly. One member of our party commented specifically on how much the crew seemed to enjoy themselves. The driver was also extremely friendly and seemed in high spirits about running his train alongside the sea.

Thanks for the effort to drop us off in Kalkbaai and pick us up again. It means about ten minutes less riding time next to the sea, but in my opinion Kalkbaai is the better place to eat and spend time. The scheduling was perfect with enough time to go to a restaurant and stroll around afterwards, before having to go to the station again (This used to be a shortcoming when steam still ran to Knysna - an hour was never enough to be able to make proper use of the Knysna Waterfront. But that problem has become irrelevant now!).

I could not help wondering where you service the loco (coal, water, etc.) as I didn't notice any such facilities at Monument Station? I also could not help wondering about your confidence in relying on one loco - from what I read in these Forums, it would seem that steam loco's are temperamental at best!

Once again, thank you. It was worth coming all the way to Cape Town from the platteland to be on your train today.

Good luck!

Hansie

[Chris Janisch]

Brilliant to see!

[Derek Walker]

Have to add my congrats to FoAR for getting this off the ground. Its the start of something big and may it go from success to success. And well done the pic taker too... I have been waiting to see pics of this trip.

[Steve Appleton]

Beautiful. I can smell the sea coming out of the pictures whilst sitting here in Johannesburg!! Congratulations, AR and FOAR!! Great to see all the hard work and the complicated behind the scenes negotiations pay off! The Cape has always deserved its own heritage railway operation and now it's back, looking stunning, running in magnificent scenery that we at FOTR can only dream about.

[Sue Lawrence]

Oh, you guys are just trying to make me feel so homesick. But this is thrilling news and I am delighted for you all. The train looks great, the weather looks good, and the scenery — well, I don't know anywhere in the world that can beat the Peninsula line for scenery. Thank you for sharing the day with us all with your photos and I hope that the train goes from from strength to strength, as I am sure that it will. Very well done to all concerned. Thank you Steve, for letting us all know that these pictures had been posted.

[Andreas Umnus]

That are really nice pictures. I wish I had seen a steam train at the line when I was there.

You really had luck with the good weather, but on the other hand that's no wonder because while we have here winter with snow, you've got sommer.
I wish you luck and many passengers for the next journeys in the future.
Although I visited the line last year, is there anywhere a turn table on the line? By the way is the line already open til Simon's Town?

Are there more pictures of this tour?

By the way, I have sucribed the German magazine "Süd-Afrika". One of the issues in the next edition shall be "Cape Town by train"
Let's hope they will mention Atlantic Rail and not only Metro Rail what I assume they will write about.

The next edition shall released on 11.03.2011

[allanroy]

Here are a few more photos, all the pictures of the train going past the beach where taken while it was backing up on its return to Fish Hoek.

[Luca Lategan]

Baie dankie Hansie! Ek is bly julle het dit geniet :)

It was a great weekend to be part of and I hope that there are LOADS more.

I created a public Facebook photo album for those who are interested, here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=3 ... 34b4f15bf1

This weekend there are two more Santa Specials, there are still some space left on Sunday afternoon's trip, email: info@atlanticrail.co.za

I could not help wondering where you service the loco (coal, water, etc.) as I didn't notice any such facilities at Monument Station? I also could not help wondering about your confidence in relying on one loco - from what I read in these Forums, it would seem that steam loco's are temperamental at best!

Hansie, everything happens at Monument station! It is not ideal to have a loco depot at a station with platforms etc etc in the way, but we make do (so far at least). Jip, these 'dames' are VERY tempremental, but if you take good care of them, they will take care of you. As far as another loco goes, mmm, watch this space ;-)