I can assure you I have been shaking myself to see if I was alive and still in the real world! Believe it or not, both the steam train and the diesel ran the entire length from Duran to Yaguachi on inaugural day.
Steam has been to Latacunga on the new track already.
What is more amazing is the daily service from Quito to Latacunga using the autoferro. My website shows the last train to Latacunga which we pushed - second class passengers out and push please -about one kilometre as it slipped so badly!
We are now working on the steam tour programme for 2011 - we dared not say anything until we could deliver - and are offering steam from Duran to Yaguachi, Sibambe to Urbina, Latacunga to Quito and autoferro Ibarra to Primer Paso, possibly only Salinas.
We are also offering autoferro from Bucay, hopefully to Huigra definitely and with the possible chance of running through to Urbina.
As for the question re Milagro I do not know what is wrong with them. One would have thought they would have welcomed tourists. However the Government plans to tell them get lost and the trains will run on the old alignment through the town. I have never met the Milagro officials so cannot assess their reasonableness to logical argument.
I would add that a previous Government gave the railway to the towns along the route, none of which had any money! They in turn tried a unique form of blackmail in that they would only allow the trains to run if they stopped in every town for one hour so the passengers could buy up the town! This would have given an estimated time from Quito to Guayaquil of about a week! The actual result was the railway was totally deprived of funds as nobody did anything but fortunately President Correas came in and you are now beginning to see the results of his vision.
I will keep you posted on who will be running toiurs and believe me we will pull out all the stops to make sure they are the best ever. I would expect both Trains Unlimited and RTC in September 2011 and hopefully mmany more.
Michael Grimes
