SHUNTING Grain Trains at NAPIER in the OVERBERG beyond CALEDON Transnet Diesels | Train South Africa

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Overberg Trains beyond CALEDON: Pt 1 - Transnet Shunting at Napier. Part of the Overberg barley harvest is stored in silos along rail routes in the area. Transnet Freight Rail transport some of barley to the SAB maltings plant at Caledon. These diesel train operations beyond Caledon are not exactly rare, but being relatively remote for local railfans to access, are not regularly recorded in photos or videos. (More often train movements between Caledon and Bellvile get recorded.) It was purely by chance that we stumbled upon train activities in March 2018 while based at L"Agulhas.

The trains are relatively short, because most silo's can only accommodate about 10 grain hoppers at a time. Some silo's do have a small shunter to move the wagons while loading at the silo, but specifically the silo's at PROTEM and NAPIER have sidings designed with a small gradient, so that wagons can by moved very slowly by gravity and working the handbrake.