There is always beauty to be found in the abandoned. It could be in the ruins of the building, nature taking back what is her's or just the surroundings. In this case it is an aloe flowering early at the unused and abandoned Humewood Station.
The narrow gauge Humewood Station has been standing abandoned, neglected and unused for probably a decade now although some of it was cleared and fixed up in December for the Apple Express to be able to run through there. It was while waiting for the train to pass wanting to grab some photos when I ended up getting into some abandoned railway photography.
A busy schedule, working till just before Christmas and all kinds of other excuses led to us only being able to go on the Apple Express on the last weekend it was running in January. And it seems I placed the photos in a folder to edit and totally forgot to do so. After nearly 8 years of inactivity, the first fase of the Apple Express' comeback took place in December with a partnership between the operator, the municipality and Transnet. The…
Behind the South End Cemetery is an old footbridge over the narrow gauge railway line which most people probably have never seen. It's not really something significant but I know of it because I have a Geocache hidden there. I went to check up on it the other day after the recent fire and snapped this pic.
The difference between the Port Elizabeth Railway Station (opened in 1899) and the Humewood Railway Station (opened in 1905) is that Humewood was built to accommodate narrow gauge - 2 ft (610 mm) - trains that made use of the Avontuur Railway (or Apple Express line as most of us know it) to the Gamtoos Valley, Kouga area and Langkloof. Sadly since the line has been closed after flooding the station has died, most of the buildings demolished and all…
It is sad to see all the unused railway infrastructure around Port Elizabeth either on the harbour, around Humewood or next to the Settlers Freeway. After a lunchtime event at This is Eat on the harbour I grabbed the camera for a couple of photos before heading back to the office.
A few years ago (quite a few if I'm correct), the historic Port Elizabeth Railway Station was damaged in an underground gas explosion. The spot was cordoned off and the building "braced" with wooden poles. So sad that all this time later and Spoornet (Transnet) still haven't done anything to restore and fix the building. An absolute crying shame.
After yesterday's picture of the Apple Express narrow gauge line I decided to post another picture featuring the line. After the line leaves Loerie it heads towards Jeffreys Bay across the lover Gamtoos Valley plains. Not far outside of Loerie the line crosses over the Loerie Spruit (a tributary of the Gamtoos River) before passing through Melon Station. There's just something about these old railway and road bridges, isn't there?
The Avontuur Railway, better known as the Apple Express narrow gauge line, was built between 1890 and 1906 to link the fruit growing Langkloof with Port Elizabeth. The line doesn't just cross the highest narrow gauge railway bridge in the world, but at 285 km is also said to be the longest narrow gauge line in the world. So sad to see it not being used and falling further and further into disrepair.
Have you ever wondered what it looks like standing on the Van Stadens Railway Bridge and looking down from it? Probably not but it's something I did when I took a walk across it a little while back.