eRECENT

Winter on the Valkenburg narrow gauge line (January 2001)

On Sunday 21 January 2001, a thin crust of frozen snow covered the area around the town of Leiden where I live. Going out cycling with my son, we came past the narrow gauge museum at Valkenburg where to my surprise there was a loco in steam standing outside. Later I returned with a camera and despite the bad light I made the photos shown below. It was bitterly cold, with more snow forecast for the evening.

The loco proved to be intended for a specially chartered train. Since the works shed is fitted with a heater the steam locos do not need to be emptied from water during the winter. For the crew it was a novel experience to roast in front and freeze in the back. The loco proved to use much more coal than usual in the cold weather.

Despite the failing light I managed to make a few passable photos at extreme exposure times, at any rate good enough to scan and reproduce here at reduced size. It was a magical experience, seeing the little train work its way around the lake and through the frozen fields, shrouded in thick white clouds of vapour.

Ted Polet

Click on any photo to enlarge.

	Left: assembling the train. Right: the train waits with the stock inside the works to prevent it from being too cold for the passengers.
	Left and right: departure from the works, with a fine show of smoke and steam.
	Left: on its outward trip, the train trails a thin black smoke plume over the frozen lake. Right: the train returns across the flat white wasteland. It might have been in Siberia.
	The train passes by on its return journey.
	At the level crossing near the works building, a show is made of flagging the little train across.
	Left: pulling away on the last few hundred yards. Right: the loco has put the stock into the shed and the driver puts on a show for the camera before putting the loco to sleep.
	Exhaust roaring, the little 0-4-0WT sprints past the camera, blowing all the soot out of its tiny boiler tubes.