Scenes in the yard at Znin. Looks a lot like Orbisonia or Chama.

 

This is strictly a tourist operation today with six daily roundtrips between Znin and Gasawa, a distance of 13 km.  Power is a diesel mechanical unit with siderods.  The narrow gauge depot, seen here from a departing train, is an easy walk from the PKP standard gauge station.

 

On the way out of the yard we see a classic snowplow.  The train passes through lush rolling farm lands much like the American midwest, and meets its counterpart at Wenecja (pronounce like Venetia).

 

At Wenecja the PKP maintains a skansen (outdoor museum) of 600 mm gauge railroading.  Until recently steamers such as these were used here. Alas, no more.  You can get off here to visit the skansen and the castle ruins across the track, then catch a later train if you like.

 

It's nearly time for departure, and the crew saunters casually back to the train.  Shortly after resuming our journey we are overtaken by a group of train chasers.  They almost passed us, but were stopped at a grade crossing just ahead.  Finally, we catch a glimpse of our destination: a reconstructed Iron Age community located on a penninsula in the lake we are skirting.

 

Durango, Colorado has Mesa Verde, and Znin has Biskupin.  Here we see a portion of the town wall and gate, and a view of the train returning to Znin.  This world class archeological site was high on my list of "must see's", and I was not disappointed.  Of course, arriving there by narrow gauge train made it all the better.

 

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