Thursday, November 05, 2009

Why I don't like modern steam trips

For some reason I find myself not overly amoured of modern preserved steam locos running on the main line. While I'll happily spend hours hunting through books and magazines looking at old pictures,todays stuff just leaves me limp. Maybe its the lack of dirt and grime, the old time wagons trailing behind, or maybe its the entourage of service wagons that they cart round with them. I'll even bear 1 or 2, but something that looks like the tank train to Palmerston North just looks really silly (cheers to Darryl Palmer for passing this on).

'Maybe its one tank per passenger? Another gin sir?'

It was therefore quite refreshing to see a trip that looked like it could have been shot 50 years ago (cheers to Drew for this). Only the Fm on the end is out of place, and at least it is red as well.

'A provincial relief express minus the grime.'

However, after looking at the clean fresh carriages, maybe it is the dirt after all...

5 comments:

Kiwibonds said...

Shame they can't put the water bottles on the end of the train and run a pipe forward, or build a water trank inside a carriage.

Agree that that shot of Drew's is a slice of rare magic in NZ's steam excursion history - a great shot of what looks like a real train.

MaverickNZ said...

Lol a tank wagon disguised as a carriage or guards van that's a genius idea. Well at least heritage diesels don't have to carry any tank cars with them lol.

Ryan

Kiwibonds said...

Trank? what's a trank...?

One day they'll put a spellchecker on here or I'll learn to spell/type/proof read

Motorised Dandruff said...

A trank- something to calm the foamers down lest they get excited by the sight of a realistic looking train.

lalover said...

"Tranky" - A foamer who gets excited about modern steam excursions....?

Oh the mind does wander.....!