Railway Holidays
Thanksgiving & Saint Nicholas
The story “How I was infected by the railway virus"; ended with the memory that the seasons were recognizable by the appearance of the railway. For example, there were Christmas greetings written by hand with chalk on railway carriages.
From stories I heard that in many railway towns, such as Altenbeken or Sangerhausen, even more far-reaching traditions were lived. So they simply took a locomotive from the shed at St. Nicholas, maybe a couple of three axles coaches standing around were hanged on it, pushed back a few hundred meters from the station as a shunting trip ? and then let St. Nicholas get off full steam at the platform track with the waiting railway children and their companions. Today such spontaneous actions are probably no longer possible without applying for train paths, ordering, paying the costs for station use according to the respective classification and scope of services, securing, etc. Unfortunately I can't show any photos of it.
In the meantime, there are organized New Year's Day trips, Easter egg search trips, Walpurgis trips, Glühwein trips, St. Nicholas trips, etc. On the Rügen narrow-gauge tracks, a thanksgiving trip with a freight wagon loaded with harvested goods took place on 20 September 1997. It ran directly behind the locomotive in front of the passenger coaches decorated with ears of grain. The cargo was white cabbage and potatoes. I have photographed the locomotive 99 4632-8 in the appearance of locomotive no. 52 of the former Rügener Kleinbahn in Putbus.
Santa Claus crossed the tracks in the Harz Mountains that same year on 6 December 1997. Here an appropriate decoration was attached to the smoke chamber door of the 99 7244-9. The first meeting took place in Alexisbad. The last picture was taken in Stiege.
I am curious to see when similar actions will also be offered by long-distance bus companies.