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Part one. Kinūra Rinkai freight operations on the JR Taketoyo Line. Warning: reduce volume for intro music at the start. Will fix it on the next one.

Another late night, ended up at Namba on the Nankai so I thought I'd go on a hobby shop crawl. I started out by going on Thunderbird #3 to Kyoto so I could get a good seat on Super Kuroshio #5 to Wakayama and get a ride on a 381 as their days are numbered. The Meiji chocolate factory is shaped like a giant chocolate. I took a photo of my hotel at Noda from the train window, my room is circled in red. At Wakayama I took a ride on the Wakayama Electric Railway.

Time flies when you're having fun. From my hotel window I can look across the river to Hiroshima Station. I crossed over to the other side of Honshu today via the Geibi and Sanko Lines and returned by the San-in and Yamaguchi Lines. The first train was a five car set of kiha 40/47's but three were left behind at the end of the suburban area with the leading two car kiha 47 continuing to Miyoshi. From there a kiha 120 ran through to Gotsu on the San-in Main Line.

I've been here a week already. I did the short branch to Miyazaki Airport this morning before going to Shibushi at the end of the Nichinan Line, I think that gives me all Japan's airport branches. Note the 'Round the Kyushu' stickers covering the 787's old names.

I've settled into the Toyoko Inn Nanba for the night. I made the first change to my itinerary this morning when I decided to take the $5.40 bus to Coolangatta Airport instead of the $40 taxi. Took about 20 minutes from stepping off the plane to walking out of the JR ticket office with my railpass so I got into town an hour earlier than I planned. Got the Rapit, or as they say 'Rapito Beta' into Nanba for Y1390 one way, a downright bargin compared to the Airtrain in Brisbane. Tested my Gogo Japan GPS on the iPhone to find the hotel, seems to work ok. Roamimg not working on the phone, at least not in Osaka anyway, all indications are that it should, if I don't have any luck tomorrow I will call Telstra and give them what for. When I got off the plane I got a text from them welcoming me to global roaming so it works when they want it to. Off to Nagoya via the Kintetsu in the moning.

I just got word that the tour to Argentina I was going on in November has been cancelled because of the Patagonian Express being blown off the track. Time to start planning 'plan B', three weeks or so in Japan. At this stage I am thinking of spending time in Nagoya, western Honshu and Kyushu.

A friend and I returned a few weeks ago from a European railfanning vacation though we only spent a few days in Germany on this trip, taking in Poland, Austria, Italy and Switzerland as well. The result being a few orders sent to DM Toys after I got home after a renewed interest in European trains.

There was a box from HS waiting for me when I returned from vacation. Inside was my 10 car set of Seibu TO31 sewage cars by One Mile. They come in a 10 box mystery pack like Tomytec vehicles but I don't know if they were repacked by HS or I was just lucky because I got all ten road numbers. The plastic wheels on the cars didn't roll well, actually they didn't roll at all, so I replaced them with Fox Valley metal wheel sets. There is no movement at all in the couplers so they might go in favour of Micro Trains couplers if they cause trouble.

You're right, I somehow got it into my head that it was 30 days even after looking at the JR pass website. That would put my calculations out but would still be 48,852 km and ¥1,182,300 in fares. If you had nothing better to do on a three week vacation that is. According to my notebook in 2011 I did 7,416.4 km on a 21 day pass without any long individual trips and ran up fares of ¥178,090 on a pass that cost ¥57,700.

Queensland Rail have not only have just two six car electric Tilt Train sets but maintain several hundred kilometers of catenary used only by those two sets once a day. In my Japanese vacation thread I posted photos I took of JR Kyushu 787's with stick on patches covering rust spots, maybe in the haste to replace older types they are not getting the shop time they need. How much local time was spent on designing those two consists west? Cheers The_Ghan Although they were loosely based on the JR Shikoku 8000 series there was a fair bit of redesign work done by Walkers in Maryborough to adapt them to local standards and conditions, during a tour of the plant when they were under construction we were told the tilt mechanism for the pantographs was an entirely Walkers design.

Queensland Rail have not only have just two six car electric Tilt Train sets but maintain several hundred kilometers of catenary used only by those two sets once a day. In my Japanese vacation thread I posted photos I took of JR Kyushu 787's with stick on patches covering rust spots, maybe in the haste to replace older types they are not getting the shop time they need.

Ah, but two steamers. It's a bit blurred but I count 25 cars in this video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLA7plQ2gLc&feature=related And the train the photographer starts chasing about 3:15 into this one has a good length train for a 9600 as well. Looks like I'll have to wait to get them though. I sent HS my payment and they went on vacation.

Paying that price for a hotel room in London got me a pokey little room in a hole in the wall place down a back street with a creaky floor and a colour TV being the only modernization done to the place since Churchill was a lad, accomodation in London is hideously expensive. luckily I spend most of my time on vacation riding trains. Japan is not only a cheaper holiday destination than most places but you also get better value for what you do spend.

When I go on vacation I give my brother my PO box key and he checks it every few days, you never know when something you preordered months ago with turn up.

Here's me thinking that for my vacation in the UK in May I was going somewhere I could speak the language. I'm going back to Japan.

Alvin, hello! I spent the month of July with my family in Brisbane on our summer vacation. We spent a day in Ipswich, touring the Workshops Museum there, and had a great time. (Plus my wife is really into bats!) Welcome to the forum! Our club rooms are at the Workshops Museum in the old tool and gauge shop (large brick building on the right at the main entrance). I missed the tour of the tool shop, unfortunately, so I would have never noticed the club rooms. Ah well! It's not on the tour as we rent the building from QR and it's technically not part of the museum, so it's closed up when we're not there. (1st Sat/3rd Sun every month).

Alvin, hello! I spent the month of July with my family in Brisbane on our summer vacation. We spent a day in Ipswich, touring the Workshops Museum there, and had a great time. (Plus my wife is really into bats!) Welcome to the forum! Our club rooms are at the Workshops Museum in the old tool and gauge shop (large brick building on the right at the main entrance).