1st April 2001

PTG Tours
Entroncamento Rail Day

Route :

Notes :
(1) A series of special trains operated around Entroncamento. Regarded as one railtour by myself as all were covered by one ticket.
(2) power station

Source : Gary Thornton.
(on all trains throughout)

Tour review :

Follow this link for some photos.

When is a railtour not a railtour ...when it's a "rail day". This day was made up of a series of special trains based around Entroncamento using quite varied "freight" motive power. Although each train was "stand alone" one ticket covered the day and most of us never shifted from the same compo all day!

Train one (no. 13836 in CP working instructions) was loco 1464 and was just the relatively short run from Abrantes (where we'd spent the night after Saturdays run over into Spain and back) to Entroncamento.

Train two (13837/8) used a pair of 2501 electrics - the first two of the class in fact, 2501 & 2502. This was a "high speed" run to Coimbra-B but, in reality, it was a slow speed stagger. Freedom of the station and adjacent stabling point netted a few new numbers and photographs before we headed back to Entroncamento with 2501 + 2502.

The loco change was to a pair of 2551 buzz-boxes, 2558 & 2567. Off northwards again, but only as far as Lamarosa. Complete farce here as we shunted about owing to single-line working caused by an engineers possession. That was nothing however compared to the run-round farce at Tomar....

.....after arrival the CP staff split the locos from the train then each other - presumably as the run-round neck couldn't cope with a pair o locos....but then for ages nothing happened. Eventually things moved but not before we'd effortlessly "lost" over an hour to the farce.

Back to Entroncamento and another loco swap - now to something a bit more worthwhile - a pair of MLW 1551's (1555 & 1568). Some decent thrash back to Abrantes then onwards to EDP Pego -a power station at the end of a freight-only line from Mouriscas. Unfortunately we couldn't get off as it was a private site (funny - in the UK it's usually only at such sites that we can bale!!).

Despite the earlier late running, with an hours layover to the last train departure at Entroncamento, we were back "on time" for the second run of the day to Tomar. Traction for this last leg was Alco 1510. What a beast!! Think mega-thrash and add to it a ships air-horn.... Yep - an experience for sure!

Arrival into Tomar wasn't too far off correct. A bit of a hike to the (rather posh) hotel. Time to freshen up then off out to a local bar for a beer (OK, severial beers...hic) and a Bifana (hot pork roll) before retiring again for some well needed zzzz's.

Verdict : another fun day out, with only 1464 and 1510 being "dud" for me. Got plenty of decent photos during the day too.

Timings :
(additional information courtesy of Matt Gaskarth)

Train reporting numbers :
13836 : Abrantes - Entroncamento (28.6km)
13837 : Entroncamento - Coimbra-B (111km)
13838 : Coimbra-B - Entroncamento  (111km)
13839 : Entroncamento - Tomar (23.13km)
13840 : Tomar - Entroncamento (23.13km)
13841 : Entroncamento - EDP Pego (52.79km)
13842 : EDP Pego - Entroncamento (52.79km)
13843 : Entroncamento - Tomar (23.13km)

Key :
a : arrival time
d : departure time
/ : passing time

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