International Railroad Discussion > FCAB Cerritos Bayos to Cumbre Loops

Most of us hit the "lack of a full night's sleep wall" on April 23 and we decided we would sleep in until 8AM. While we didn't see any trains that morning, I think recovering our ability to think and function was worth it. Driving out of Calama back to Antofagasta, we made a stop at Cerritos Bayos to shoot the old station there. Our hopes of getting a train too were thwarted. Wanting to get back to the Loops at the top of Cumbre Pass, we kept going. We encountered an eastbound train west of Sierra Gorda and raced back to the black hills east of the town. I thought the train was too close for me to hike up the hill, so I shot it from some kind of wall ruin that must have been part of a mine. It had the homebuilt engines (which I've come to think of as SD39-2s with a bad haircut). Farther east, we overtook a train with the new power (which I will always call SD70s from here on). We stopped to shoot that before using the high sun hours to get back west. At Prat we saw a train of Newfies, cathodes and empty tanks about to climb the hill heading west. We shot it at Gaviota and then headed to the loops where we waited first for an eastbound and then our westbound. After that, two of us peeled off and drove through La Negra for a few hours looking for the local switcher. We ended up not seeing or shooting a single train.

Images one and two are of the old station at Cerritos Bayos. Note the water tank has no spout (and there was no place for a spout on it either.

 

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Images three and four are of the eastbound sulfuric acid train east of Sierra Gorda. I beleive this train is going up to Conchi.

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Image five is of the westbound train we caught farther west of Sierra Gorda.

Image six is now at Prat, a grab of the lead engine on the westbound Newfie, cathode, empty tank train that was taking the Pampa Prat Branch up over Cumbre.

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Images seven and eight are a coming and going of the Newfie, cathode, empty tank train climbing the hill a bit beyond Gaviota.

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Images ten and eleven are of the eastbound train coming through the loops. This train carries sulfuric acid from Mejillones up to one of the mines. The Pampa Prat Branch, which the loops are part of, had been abandoned in 1919 due to its steep grades. The line was rebuilt in the mid 1990s in order to avoid having sulfuric acid trains running through the city of Antofagasta. 

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Images 11 through 13 are of a train with empty tank cars and loaded copper cathode flats headed west to Mejillones. These NF210s have been repowered with 645 prime movers.

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Last image is at the summit and is of the helper from the first train on the loops, now waiting to return light down the hill.

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