13th July 2015 - The long way roundMonday 13th July 2015 Time to move on after an excellent 10 days in Hungary, next stop Zagreb but not the obvious way as we wanted to go via Hodoš and Slovenia to have a ride behind a Slovenian Railways 664 diesel. The train concerned, "Citadella", did not leave Budapest until 13:35 meaning we would need to find something to keep us amused in the morning so we packed the bags, purchased a brace of Budapest day cards and went off to Nyugati station to see what locos could be scratched in. Getting a day ticket was probably a bit extravagent but we needed tickets for the tram and to get to Deli station later on plus they would come in handy to flash at the conductors whilst doing local moves to save filling the Interrail in. A good couple of hours were had shuttling up and down between Nyugati, Zugló and Kőbánya-Kispest, the pick of the bunch of locos being 630.042 which obligingly appeared on an "O" train to Záhony, then it was back to the hotel to collect the bags and check out. We did consider traipsing down the road to Keleti, catching something round to Kelenfold then another train into Déli but that sounded like too much bother in the hot weather so we went straight there on the Metro in good time to make sure of bagging a seat on the train.
With over an hour to wait before departure we made use of the time to get some supplies and an IC reservation for the return journey from Szombathely next Friday as there would be insufficient time to get one on the day. On the subject of reservations we were a little confused in respect of “Citadella” itself; the IR “App” said that one was needed for part of the journey but past experience told us otherwise. The train was fairly busy, mostly with backpacking types in second class and our compartment was invaded by two young men shortly before departure who subsequently discovered that they had the right seat numbers but the wrong coach after making themselves comfortable.
Two more young men replaced them at Székesfehérvár and settled down for the duration, we guessed that they were going all the way to Ljubljana. The conductor eventually came round well into the journey, a personable young man who actually checked the tickets properly (few conductors do in our experience), noted where we were going and wished us a pleasant journey, no mention of any reservations. A short section of new track was had as the train took the Boba avoiding line and, conversely, the other section of new track we had on this journey was into and out of the station at Zalaegerszeg, where we had taken the avoiding line on our only previous trip along this line. We did harbour a small hope that the train might get a different loco at Zalaegerszeg but 431.301 ran round and carried on towards the Slovenian border at Hodoš. At one stage we noticed a cycle path and thought that it might be on the track bed of a closed railway but when it followed the line we were on for some distance without heading off we realised that it had actually been the main line which had been quite heavily re-aligned at that point. Subsequent investigations revealed that the original line between Zalalövő and Murska Sobota had been closed in 1968 and lifted but rebuilt / replaced between 1999 and 2001 by a brand new line as part of the Pan-European network. This line was later electrified to Hodoš in 2010 and at the time of our journey was in the process of being electrified between Hodoš and Pragersko, hence our desire to ride behind a diesel before the big switch-on.
We pulled into Hodoš with a certain amount of trepidation as Siemens “Hercules” diesel ER20.003 had been drafted into the area since the overhead wires had been restored beyond Borovnica last month and we certainly did not want that. It did happen to be at Hodoš but was shut down in the opposite platform and we were pleased to see the familiar outline of a 664 waiting in the distance for 431.301 to be removed from the train. It turned out to be 664.102, the first one of the class that we had for haulage but quite acceptable considering the only other alternative in sight!
With only load four and a flat, modern, well-aligned piece of railway there was never going to be too many fireworks on the noise front but it was a good run and something to savour before the electrics take over. Most of the track work had been completed apart from one deviation including a replacement halt at Pavlovci, near Ormož but although most of the masts looked to be in place there was a distinct lack of catenary in places and hardly any wires at all. We arrived at Pragersko a little late and could see the 342 in the distance waiting to back on but when it got a little closer we realised that there was a class 363 propelling it, a good result even after the “list” was checked and it was found to be dud.
South of Pragersko there was a long section of engineering work resulting in several kilometers of single line with the second track completely removed down to the foundation. It took about 15 minutes to negotiate at slow speed, no wonder some trains were replaced by a bus service. We arrived about 15 minutes late at Celje, still in plenty of time for EC159 though that was also running late as it had to negotiate the same engineering works. Although there was the inevitable class 342 on the front we decided it was time for some refreshment from the buffet to toast our crazy roundabout move. It was a trouble free run to Dobova where we stayed on the train whilst the passports were checked resulting in a run down the platform at Zagreb just in time to see 1142.013 being uncoupled, another dud loco to end the day but at least the move had worked and we had a 664 which was the main point of the journey.
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