The end of the Taieri Gorge railway. The railway siding at Middlemarch is looking slightly forlorn due unfortunately to the iconic tourist railway being closed currently. Sadly perhaps, another part of our history being lost.Hopefully in the future it will reopen.
The line carries on as the popular Central Otago Rail trail cycling trail.
Oil on canvas 400x600x20mm
An apt description by poet Lorraine Gilmour, formerly of Ranfurly.
End of the Line
Unused, discarded and abandoned
it sits at the end of the line,
was once the hub of the district
now it sits there not looking so fine.
It’s life used up in a few short years
man’s intervention once again,
determined by so called progress
while others they bear the shame.
A town it dies when cut off at the knees
and who suffers the most from the pain,
it’s the people who live in the present
left to suffer with little to gain.
The train that used the goods shed
it stopped passing through this town,
the only train that comes here now
bring the tourists who wander around.
Lorraine Gilmour
Lorraine’s poems