Through the mist…

The lake at Lukavac was entirely shrouded in fog when I stepped out of the hotel this morning and much of the surrounding area was equally affected, as was Dubrave where we turned up with minutes to spare before the departure of a scheduled freight working. I ran around doing my best headless chicken impression to get some shots in the atmospheric conditions before joining everyone at the bridge to get a good viewpoint for the departure. It was one of the most memorable moments of the trip and I hope that some of that comes across in the video footage I took…

After leaving Dubrave behind we headed to Sikulje, the last of the colliery systems which use class 33 steam locomotives. We spent some time here watching movements around the yard before heading down the line to get some shots as it departed. Later we carried on to Bukinje for a final visit.

In the afternoon we had some time to kill as there were no steam hauled freight workings scheduled until late afternoon/early evening. It was a warm day so a few of us spent some time sitting around on the kerbside drinking bottles of Bosnian beer…

Kriegsloks!

A quick glance out of the window in the morning told me all I needed to know… this was no day to be outside taking photographs. The rain was absolutely pissing down and it was suddenly all too obvious how the forest could be so lush and green!

We drove to Bukinje depot on the outskirts of Tuzla where the yard was almost underwater, such was the deluge. A few shunting movements were arranged with their class 62 locomotive and you can see how wet the conditions were from the rapidly growing swamp…

Bukinje underwater!

It was lucky that there so much to see and keep us inside the shed, where a class 33 locomotive (the German class 52) was undergoing a heavy overhaul. A quite remarkable sight for 2010 in a world where the steam locomotive is now almost extinct outside of preservation. The staff in the shed were incredibly friendly and rightly proud of their kriegsloks (war locomotives) which had been re-patriated from the Russian front.

Kriegslok from Dubrave

In the afternoon the rain eased off and we got our first real taste of a kriegslok in action at a level crossing outside Dubrave. The sight and sound was truly superb. Later, we got a second helping at Ljubace where a diesel from the state railway had delivered some wagons which were then collected by a kriegslok.

At the end of the day we headed to the Hotel Senad od Bosne located on the shores of an artificial lake at Lukavac. It was a superb base for the final four days of our tour with great food and plentiful draughts of Tuzlanska.