Funny looking numbers heading to confirmation, impossible looking overtakes happening and not happening and happening yet again, ripping past the insignificant ones shunted on precisely the loops where we predict them to be shunted, tussle of priorities - the expected ones and the jaw dropping ones, NCR-ALD never fails to entertain.
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Purushottam departed NDLS sharp at 22:25 and sitting over eight thousand nautical miles away in San Jose, I was as good as being aboard. ALD Humsafar vanished from WIMT and NTES but was later found heading ahead at SBB. As...
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we touched ANVR, Prayagraj had exited the end of Delhi’s jungle at CPYZ, REWA was way far ahead. Ranikhet was left behind at SBB. GZB had the option of letting Puru go straight or make LKO Mail (no wait LJN Mail, what era am I living in?) do the painfully slow criss-cross and go left and the choice they made isn’t as likely to go in favor of MB bound trains as it did that night.
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Thrashing the ALCo hauled Kalindi at 120 made us wish that the others hadn’t been cancelled/diverted on that day. Two blocks ahead, three blocks ahead, seven kilometers ahead, right there; the chase with Humsafar was as intense as it can be and in no time came the scintillating PF skip of ALJN. Bang in the middle of the night under the well-lit canopy structure at complete MPS, the feeling is just as exciting as the description would sound to a railfan. But just when the distance to Prayagraj hit the absolute minimum, TDL happened. And the NI works made it a bottleneck as bad as CNB is on a regular day. The Prayagraj-REWA duo fled into the oblivion and there was no way we were getting hold of them. Humsafar? Maybe. As a matter of fact, two hundred kilometers later the Humsafar did overtake Prayagraj at Bhaupur.
Cut to the excruciating slowdown at Panki dham. The typical CNB congestion that is. And this is where the most talked about event of NCR happened. Prayagraj overtook Humsafar yet again at Juhi cabin to arrive into CNB ahead of Humsafar by 3 minutes. Puru was shown its place and stayed right behind. Everything was ahead of schedule at Rura and everything arrived late at CNB by 10-15 minutes. Typical, yet again. The Humsafar would have again thrashed Prayagraj later before ALD but that’s beyond the most exciting segment.
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Waitlist 210 confirmed into a 130kmph SL class journey with a window seat showcasing a sneak-peak of every little facet of NCR that railfans talk about. Also, you reached Kanpur from Delhi. What more can you ask of Three Hundred and Seven rupees?