Whilst wandering through the bamboo forest I was pretty certain that I could hear the occasional steam whistle, but it only when we came out to the final section that I could see a little building that looked like a rail halt, with benches made from rail wheels and axles. Further investigation was required!

It was indeed a rail halt, and the rail line ran across a multi-arched stone viaduct that we had walked under when going into the Bambouseraie.

And a train was due in seven minutes ….

The line runs between Anduze and Saint Jean du Gard and on the day I saw it used a restored Krupps loco built in 1937. The line’s Facebook page shows other locos, but it is in French (of course!). The Krupps was seen in a Tour de France telecast recently, posed on a bridge near to the road.

There was a vélorail advertised at the rail halt, an interesting way of seeing former railway lines and from the rail owners point of view, requiring very little work. It’s a concept which has yet to occur in Australia, although I have seen several such projects in France, including one with motorised trolleys (not running on the routes with pedal powered trolleys, of course!)