The Tralee and Dingle Light Railway Traditional Geocache
The Tralee and Dingle Light Railway
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
(regular)
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This is located at Camp Junction; the location of a Water Tower which helped refill the Dingle train on it's journey from Tralee to Dingle. The train operated between 1891 and 1953. If you look around the vicinity you will see other evidence of the train line, there is a lot of train memorabilia in the area. Some pieces of the track were used locally to form parts of building projects and furnish rails for the local bar counters and some other unique recycling uses!
The cache is located near the side of the main Tralee-Dingle N86 route. The Tralee and Dingle Light Railway ran along side this road until 1953. The container is a white plastic lunch box. There are a lot of historic train and road memorabilia in the area, the cache is located next to an item that was once a common sight on Irish roads.
History of the train:
The Tralee and Dingle Light Railway and Tramway was a 51 km (31.65 mi), 914 mm (3 ft) gauge narrow gauge railway running between Tralee and Dingle, with a 10 km (6 mi) branch from Castlegregory Junction to Castlegregory, in County Kerry on the west coast of Ireland. It operated between 1891 and 1953, the Castlegregory branch closed shortly prior the outbreak of the Second World War. It was the most westerly railway line in Europe.
Early years
The railway was built as cheaply as possible, largely following adjacent roads, resulting in some very tight curves and severe gradients. The railway opened on 31 March 1891, but from start income failed to cover operating expenses. In March 1893 the Board of Trade held an inquiry into poor management and operating practices on the railway; nevertheless a fatal accident (involving a runaway train) took place at Curraduff in May of the same year. The railway continued to require public subsidies from local ratepayers, which were able to be reduced in 1898 after a grant from the Treasury (although the line continued to require subsidies throughout its existence). In 1907 a further grant of £23,000 (just over €2 Million in 2007/8 values) was made to allow the scene of the accident at Curraduff to be bypassed and other improvements made.
Decline and closure
In the 1930s the road between Tralee and Dingle was improved, allowing buses and lorries to effectively compete with the railway. The infrastructure of the railway becoming increasingly dilapidated and, in parts, unsafe. The passenger train service was timetabled to run from Dingle to Tralee in 155 minutes (for a journey of little over 31 miles), whilst the competing bus service took 105 minutes.
On 17 April 1939, all passenger services were withdrawn; the Castlegregory branch was closed completely. A single daily goods train continued to run until 1947, when coal shortages forced its temporary withdrawal. Thereafter a special train (for cattle) was operated once per month in connection with the fair at Dingle. These trains finally ended in June 1953.
An extraordinary event occurred at Dingle station on 13 June 1940. Already closed to passengers, a German spy named Walter Simon arrived at the station and asked when the next train would depart (not realising that only freight services were still operating). Simon had been landed by a German submarine, U-38, during the previous night. He then made his way by bus to Tralee and thence by train to Dublin. Following his enquiry at Dingle station the Garda Siochana were informed and he was trailed by detectives. He was arrested on arrival in Dublin and interned for the duration of the War (known in neutral Ireland as "The Emergency").[1]
A 3 km section has now been reopened as a preserved line[2] between the Aquadome in Tralee and Blennerville Windmill. The railway was not open during 2007 and faces an uncertain future as the solitary steam locomotive is, once again, out of action.
[Note on Cache Maintenance: This cache will be maintained by a local resident and the details are on file with Geocaching.com]
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Haqre ohfu gb gur yrsg bs byq ebnq fvta.