Trans Andean

[Train jaune]

Took a bus ride from Mendoza in Argentina, to Santiago, in Chile this week. The route, in Argentina at least, largely followed the route of the Trans Andean railway that closed in the 1980s. The infrastructure, including rails, all looks to be still be in place, but rather overgrown and not in a good state. Some of the bridges have collapsed. Not sure about the Chilean side. The Argentinian side was a long gradual climb to the summit. Once over the border it was more like dropping off the edge of a cliff. Not sure how the railway coped with that. I'd recommend the trip, but be prepared for an hours long wait at border control.

 

[RT4038]

Took a bus ride from Mendoza in Argentina, to Santiago, in Chile this week. The route, in Argentina at least, largely followed the route of the Trans Andean railway that closed in the 1980s. The infrastructure, including rails, all looks to be still be in place, but rather overgrown and not in a good state. Some of the bridges have collapsed. Not sure about the Chilean side. The Argentinian side was a long gradual climb to the summit. Once over the border it was more like dropping off the edge of a cliff. Not sure how the railway coped with that. I'd recommend the trip, but be prepared for an hours long wait at border control.

Sounds like an exciting trip!

 

[dutchflyer]

There was a fairly recent post about a minor try to revive railways/ferrocarriles in Chili. There I also wrote I did that trip-exactly same, in the late 90ies, but cannot remember a thing of this ride-must have been overnite too, I Guess. Even then also the Chile side was out of use-the major domestic railway going south from SANtiago however was still working then and I used it to Concepcion. In ARG before that used an overnite-obviously then in the final stages of near dead-from BsAs toward Paraguay (cannot remember what town now)-coming back on a splendid overnite luxurious bus (coach for Brits) from those famous waterfalls was clear that those won head on compared to the ferrocarriles-and that was all before those low-cost budget airlines took the major half of transport.

 

[Train jaune]

Road down the Chilean side

 

[stuu]

Once over the border it was more like dropping off the edge of a cliff. Not sure how the railway coped with that. I'd recommend the trip, but be prepared for an hours long wait at border control.

It was a rack railway on both sides of the border - and the Chile side had a big deviation down a side valley - if you look at a satellite map it's clear where the railway used to be