Albatros Historic Train Engine in Bratislava

Since more than a decade one of my favorite photo blogs is Grumpy’s World, created by a talented gentleman who made a craft of shooting trains. I warmy recommend a visit to his blog if you want to know more about train pictures (and much more).

I’m no railfan myself but since I’ve heard about this celebration voyage of the famous Albatros engine with several passenger cars of the period, I thought appropriate to try to grab some pictures, mostly to check how it feels to be railside with a camera. I confess that I loved it.

These pics, despite being badly flawed and lacking sharpness (1/100 second hand held is not enough to stop a moving train, I should have known better…), are my first attempt: hopefully the subject and some half decent compositions will make up for the technical disaster.

You can appreciate the sheer amount of smoke when the train started moving from the main station of Bratislava, Slovakia.

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Zooming a bit I was able to catch the train entering a gallery just below my postion (I was also cutting the engine with the scenery in the process, a capital sin).

After arriving in Devinska Nova Ves, the engine was detached from the train in order to manouver and take position for the trip backwards. The foggy weather actually melts well with the smoke from the engine with an acceptable result.

Whit the train entering the station in Devinska Nova Ves I was able to catch what I think is called a “wedge shot”.

The Engineer looked more or less the same “vintage” of the engine.

On its return voyage the lead engine was travelling backwards, with the rest of the train attached on the “wrong side”. Imagine my surprise as I saw it, here entering the Lamac station. On the right side a couple of diesel-powered cars, also part of the event.

All pictures were (badly) taken through a Nikon D7000 and a 10 year old Nikkor Zoom lens.

I hope you enjoyed, ciao!