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Haha I agree they would look better! Always a bit scared to fiddle with the pantos but maybe I just need to be braver...

Hornby Arnold making the Italian N gauge community very happy with not only the D445 diesels to look forward to but also another articulated Italian electric, the E646s in a variety of guises! 😍 The years of famine are well and truly over now! Going to have to build an extension with a Ventimiglia style roundhouse for this glut of motive power 😅 Present day Frecciarossa ETR1000 trainsets also inbound too!

The TEE 'Vesuvio' Milan-Naples used these GC coaches too so yours can just take the train ferry into Sicily after a short run from Naples... !

Enter the TEE Ligure! 😍 After tracking down the KATO/Pirata 4 carriage set that supplies FS 'Gran Conforto' variant dining, luggage-generator and two first class carriages I can induct an example of an FS operated international TEE service, as it would have been constituted 1972-82 (after 1982 second class carriages were added and the TEE Ligure was reclassified as an InterCity service on a shortened Milan-Nice route). The GC carriages are extremely long - but can make it round if the driver takes care! Typically a blue/grey E444 would have been deployed at the head of this service, but Caimano could and did appear too!

Which reminds me - what's better than one Caimano? Due Caimani! An investment courtesy of my Continental Modeller article fee 😁 And the perfect compliment to all those Interfrigo vans I accumulated!

New tool Hornby Arnold D445 now inbound for 2024! Including a DCC sound version 😁

Thank you! That is certainly a good price - although I must confess that I have just 'invested' in further traction and accompanying rolling stock for Liguria and so may have exhausted my budget for now 😅 Pictures to follow upon arrival!

Haha it is indeed - I almost called this out myself but thought I'd see if anyone noticed! This angle is the most photogenic on the layout so the westbound trains are disproportionately photographed 😉 Maybe this is one portion of a freight that is being marshalled at Ventimiglia before being collated with French armoured equipment and routed circuitously across Europe to the USAF's Ramstein AFB for onward despatch?! And thank you! 😄 Converting to H0 tempted me for so long, I was so glad when Arnold announced the E656/55 in N!

Leopard 2s for Ukraine: an E655 rumbles along the Ligurian coast hauling a train loaded with NATO armoured vehicles ultimately bound for Ukraine including the first Leopard 2s, a number of M113 APCs and an M109 howitzer.

Leopard 2s for Ukraine: I have a long standing interest in military modelling and, more generally, defence policy and as a nod to this I have started to build out a train loaded with armoured vehicles - in this case 2x Leopard 2 tanks (as per much recent press, shortly to be supplied to Ukraine), 4x M113 APCs and 1x M109 howitzer (each as already supplied to Ukraine). Of course, the European rail network is an important part of efficiently moving heavy armour across Europe, even if the Ligurian coast route itself is perhaps not likely to find use as a key supply artery! The Roco minitanks vehicles woudl all benefit from some weathering - which is on the to do list!

Very pleased to see that sleeper services will return to the (eastern) side of the Ligurian coast route with Nightjet to offer overnight services from Munich and Vienna to Liguria (Genoa, then La Spezia). A trip could be in order! https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2022/dec/13/the-best-new-european-train-journeys-for-2023

Thank you very much - I think it is some kind of iron law that you either don't take or don't take enough photo's in hindsight! I actually only have a handful of pictures of E656's on the Ligurian coast myself. I do find the H0 models very appealing and there is a good amount of support in H0 so I hope you get to embark on the project at some point!

Grazie mille! You will recognise a couple, but not all, of the pictures!

Absolutely delighted to say that Liguria will be making an appearance in the next upcoming issue of Continental Modeller, available from December 15! I've spent decades reading model railway magazines marvelling at the standard of layouts within, can't quite believe Liguria will now be one of them 🤩

On Lockdown Liguria, I made the most of the last of the September sun with an outdoor running session and photo shoot - the track on the ledge at the front of the layout was ultimately replaced, re-ballasted and re-weathered after warping in the heatwave when I attempted a photo shoot in the summer. Fortunately I think the track looks better this time around than when first done! I continue my incremental acquisition of Interfrigo vans with the rake now at six - appreciate that XMPR cargo livery with Interfrigo vans is probably a stretch and so each additional van also takes me incrementally closer to a pearl grey/blue liveried E.656 😅

Belatedly - I certainly don't get to Liguria as often as I would like and contributions from 'boots on the ground' in Liguria are most welcome! As you say, it is pretty hard to get English language info and so all snippets gratefully received. It woudl be good news indeed if a handful of Caimano were retained for freight work, although suspect they are perhaps most likely retained for stock moves and/or simply stored.

Thanks Trevor, much appreciated - any modeller is always pleased to here that it reminds another, who is not as invested in the layout, of the real thing! Incidentally, assuming your bio line is up to date (Runcorn) I am originally from the North West (near Northwich) and so have a strong interest in its chemicals traffic and related industry. A very different counterpoint to that of Italian railways!

A Mercitalia Rail E483 picks its way along a single track section of the Ligurian coast with a rake of Eaos wagons

Further confirmation of why the sides of the rails are painted white in Italy on the prototype - after a couple of hours in Sunday's sun, the rail on the inside of the reverse curve had heated and expanded so much it broke entirely free of the sleepers! Permanent way repairs were implemented with Gorilla Glue and running has been restored...

The Caimano also enjoyed the sun 😎

Lockdown Liguria has ventured outside to take advantage of the almost Ligurian sun for a photoshoot!

Passenger operations this evening! Particularly enjoying pairing an XMPR loco with matching XMPR livery carriages for the first time.

An E655 'Caimano' hauls a lengthy intermodal train east along the Ligurian Coast out of the Port of Genova

Did I mention I went for DCC sound?!

A lifetimes aspiration... fulfilled! The Caimano is also my birthday present from my wife, which is actually next month - fortunately and in her words "you've waited long enough"! I'm also pleased to say that the E655 lives up to the (not inconsiderable) expectations upon it and my example is silky smooth, powerful and sure footed. The articulation in model form is a joy and as per the prototype certainly helps on those tight curves!