Monday, October 17, 2011

Monday 17 October - Alghero to Arbatax

Pictures will follow

There was a quick ride to the station and we caught the narrow gauge diesel train (two railcars and a trailer) into Sassari. The train was quite comfortable for a commuter run, the track had been upgraded with new ties and some rail, rail joints had been welded.
Alghero - the amount of grafitti was disgusting
At Sassari we took the bus to Mandas where the narrow gauge railway is spending an enormous amount of money on track and equipment repairs even though it is shut down at the moment with no word when it will reopen. They were working on two teak passenger cars which were beautiful. The screws that secured the siding had the slots all pointing upwards – amazing attention to detail. There is a steam locomotive which is steamable – looked like it could be steamed almost straight away although I don't know about the boiler certificate.
The interlocking frame had yet to be hooked up to the trackwork
 

A lot of this equipment will never be used again.

We had an excellent lunch at a local restaurant and then continued on to Nuoro - nothing to see there.
The countryside is very very dry .  It started out through a long wide valley and we then climbed to 1,000 metres before descending to the coast at Arbtax.   I wonder how the steam engine will be able to cope with the climbing tomorrow.
 Click below to see all pictures taken on this line in slide show format

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