Wednesday, December 12, 2018

Railroads of Greece 6b: The Lost Locomotives of Myloi (with Tri-X film)

Myloi is a sleepy town on the west side of the Bay of Naufplio (Nauplion), which is at the north end of the Argolic Gulf in southern Greece. The narrow-gauge (1.0-meter) Peloponnese railroad passes (more accurately, passed) through town. The main line from Athens comes in from the north via the town of Argos. Heading south, the line runs along the coast to Myloi and then turns west, ascending the mountains towards Tripoli. I found some Tri-X frames that I took in 2016 in Myloi at the old rail yard. Here, steam locomotives had been parked and semi-forgotten for decades. I presented some digital frames from Myloi before.
The old locomotives are rusting away slowly, although with Greece's dry climate, the deterioration is not nearly as severe as it would be in a rainy climate. Giant eucalyptus trees loom over the tracks and old locomotives.
The label of "mouseĆ­o" indicates that at one time, this locomotive was to be used for some sort of display or museum. What happened to that plan? I would not be surprised if the economic crisis that started in 2008-2009 dashed hopes for a rail museum.
This is the depot, which, as of 2016, was secure and in good condition. Many of the tracks had new ties and bedding. Status of the Peloponnese railroad and all this equipment and infrastructure: unknown.
Water spigot for steam locomotives, Myloi, Greece.
These photographs are from Kodak Tri-X 400 film exposed with a Rolleiflex 3.5E twin-lens reflex camera with 75mm f/3.5 Xenotar lens. The negatives are rough. I did a poor job with developing, and the film was thin and had spots and lint. I cleaned the lint with the heal tool in Photoshop CS3. I scanned the negatives with a Minolta Scan Multi film scanner, operated with Silverfast Ai software.

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