You thought I was joking about Ecuador track! Here is a train on it

I can see that a number of readers simply did not believe me. Thats what happens when you come from a society where if something is not up to standard the Government comes along and makes you fix it. In Ecaudor the railway is the government and the people depend on it for transport and supplies so it is totally immaterial the condition of anything. As management you just run your daily trains no matter what it takes.

So first for the doubting Thomases who do not believe the trains run and wanted to see samples I attach same. One is No. 86 doing the daily run from Ibarra to Primer Paso.

I would say that in GFD Matts photo what has happened there is that the track is out of gauge and everyone is pitching in to restore it. Again believe it or not we use tape measures for gauging as an inch here or there does not really matter!

As for union relations in his photo are my good friends No. 1 from the left Chambi who is a driver and No. 4 from left is Horatio - who is probably driving the second train behind - who is also a driver. When something gives a problem there is no demarcation and everyone, drivers, brakeman and sometimes even passengers pile in to help.

Ed Stabler suggested llamas would be cheaper. Yes, we do have llamas who perform that function but they are not scheduled llamas but appear out of farmers fields!

K27 mentions god help us when it rains - as it often does. He is spot on and that is our one nightmare and can cause chaos. Last year I can remember only too well we took seven hours for five kilometres and attached two photo of that with me driving, two crew sanding the line with mud from the ditch - we had run out of sand - and the passengers walking! Notice our sander sits on the bonnet and holds on with one hand while sprinkling the sand with another.

Michael Grimes