Date: 9th August 2009
My trip to Punalur was just a precursor to the Tenmalai and Coutrallam trip. I wanted to verify for myself if the trains were running between Punalur and Shencottah and also calculate the time I will take to get to Punalur the next week so as to catch the first passenger train to Shencottah.
I left my hostel room at around 6:45 am. Reached the Bus stand by 7 am and found the Tenkasi Fast Passenger waiting. The bus started by 7:15 am and passed through Kadapakkada, Chandanathoppu, Elampalloor, Kundara, Ezhukone, Kottarakara, Changamanadu, Kunnicode, Vilakudy, Elampal and finally Punalur. It was 8:25 am when I reached Punalur railway station bus stop and made my way towards the railway station. The time was very much perfect as the train was about to leave the station.
I took some distant snaps and one close up snap of the train. Then purchased a platform ticket and loitered around for a while. I had my breakfast, at a place with access to water nearby. Tea, I had from a hotel nearby, which I came to know was nearly 40 years old but had shifted inside the new building housing the railway station. The hotel or rather stall was in the place where I was standing. I then went on to meet the Station master to enquire about the availability of dormitory at Tenkasi. The station master said that those would be easily available at Rs. 75 per day. Feeling satisfied with the assurance that I would get an accommodation I took leave of the station master. I noted down the train timings and left the station to see the suspension bridge.
The bridge is nearly 10-15 minutes walk from the Railway station. Now in a dilapidated condition it is very much amazing as to how buses used to pass through the very narrow openings of the bridge. The only indication that this is a heritage structure is the year ‘1877’ inscribed in Bridge towers and a notice declaring the bridge as a protected monument. The wooden planks are also in a pretty bad state. I saw the railway bridge opposite the suspension bridge and thought that it would be an ideal place to take photos of the bridge from a different angle so I moved towards it. On reaching the top of the over bridge I saw a railway employee sitting on the concrete slab near the railway tracks. I enquired when the next train was scheduled to pass through the bridge to which he replied that it would be more than 2 hours or so till a train will be coming in this direction. Thus assured I walked across the bridge and took some snaps. I returned back to where I had met the Railway employee. I came to know that he was a key man by the name Vishwanathan. He had been with the railways for the past 35 years now and was nearing retirement age. In this section of the metre gauge from the start of his railway career itself, he had been posted in various locations in this section.
He told me a lot about the technical terms like the track alignments, indication boards. Besides he mentioned that the bridge was located at a point exactly 716 kilometres and 300 metres from Chennai. He also mentioned that PSC examination papers always had a question about the exact distance at which the bridge was situated. He spoke about a lot of things about Railways about life also. We nearly chatted for two hours and were brought back to the present by the train whistle. I took a snap of a very valuable ‘Key’ man and the train turning around. I took leave of Vishwanathan and returned to the Punalur bus stand by 12:10 pm. Although the bus departed by 12:35 pm only and reached Kollam by 2 pm. It was indeed a very good precursor of the things to come next week.
No comments:
Post a Comment