Loose_Grip/Pete's photos with the keyword: vapeur

Going back over 53 years to my first visit to France for this broadside comparison with the previous post. Between turns on the commuter trains SNCF 141TC 2-8-2 39 lays up in the siding at the platform end at Paris Gare du Nord. Note the hose pipe topping up the sidetanks. Built in 1934 these big ex-Nord 2-8-2 tanks were impressive machines & at this time they were working the very intensive push & pull suburban services smokebox-first out of Paris. All were withdrawn by August 1970 when steam finished in Paris and only one example was preserved.

An interesting display at the French railway Cité du Train in Mulhouse. Ex-Chemins de fer du Nord 2-8-0 140 A 259 minus her tender, has been turned on its side to simulate a déraillement.

The Beast from the East(ern Region)! Before we left for Southall shed British Railways Standard 4-6-2 70013 Oliver Cromwell had to endure a blizzard in the siding at Norwich Thorpe. In fact we were off 90 mins late because that DB Schenker freight train on the left was blocking us in. Despite that we arrived on Southall shed only 60 minutes late. The weather hardly effected us except to make us bleeding cold of course!

Southern Railway King Arthur N15 4-6-0 777 Sir Lamiel runs off shed to work the 10.00 service to Leicester North.

Stanier Black 5 4-6-0 45305 heads the 10.15 ex-Loughborough between the A46 and Birstall.

This last gasp of Chinese steam is no more and as far as is known there are no other regular standard gauge steam-hauled passenger trains left in China. Or the world? The Baiyin Non-ferrous Metals Company 07.50 workers' morning train from Baiyin Town, headed by SY 2-8-2 1581 again, climbs up the valley.

French steam SNCF 141-TD-740 on a special passenger train at Meymac station. 141-TD-740 was built in 1932 by la Compagnie des Chemins de Fer de l'Est for suburban services in Paris. It was later transferred to the Western Region & worked out of Gare Saint-Lazare until electrification in 1967. Withdrawn from SNCF in 1968 it was chosen for preservation at the Mulhouse Railway Museum but after languishing for 14 years out in the open it was deemed irreparable and was sold. C.F.T.L.P., Chemin de Fer Touristique Limousin - Périgord, purchased the engine in 1982 and it was restored to working order. It was classified as a "monuments historiques au titre de la préservation du patrimoine industriel" by ministerial decree in 1987. The CFTLP still run special trains in SW France the next being 23rd/24th June - see: www.trainvapeur.com/programmes/programme.htm for details.

Paris Gare du Nord 2-8-2T 141TC12 departs September 1969. A second 141TC simmers in the adjacent platform on the left. All the atmosphere of a main line capital terminus. With the services out of Gare de la Bastille these were the last suburban steam trains in France. Quite a change from the Eurostars that arrive at these platforms today. My girlfriend of the time studied French at Aberystwyth University & was in Paris for an induction course at the Sorbonne to prepare for her year as a teaching assistant in Verdun. While she studied I photographed. She obviously took the course very seriously as she ended up marrying a frenchman! Still I took my photography seriously too & I still have a liking for french steam, paticularly these modern looking tanks.