Barcelona/Esplugues, from 3 to 9 (+10) September, 2011

BARCELONA, the capital of Catalonia, welcomes you to the 58th MOROP CONGRESS, 39 years after the last and only congress held here.

Even though, for logistic requirements, the venue of the congress is in ESPLUGUES DE LLOBREGAT, the two cities are one beside the other and the point of reference is the BARCELONA – SANTS station.

Southern Europe has not been very prodigious in the organisation of MOROP congresses, this is why we are inviting you to join us and enjoy trains, camaraderie and, why not, the climate.

We have prepared an activities program that includes working steam trains every day; and all this in a country where we have not been very conservationist. This therefore represents the considerable effort made by all participating groups. We want you to return home with very good memories of what members from the south are capable of doing.

We will complete a long journey through Catalonia. We will travel to the area of Lleida and board the Tren dels Llacs (lake railway) to penetrate into the mountains of the Pre-pyrenees, travelling through the fascinating landscapes and skirting what we hope will be brimming lakes. We will visit the Railway Museum in Vilanova, housing the largest collection of steam locomotives in Southern Europe, and line L9 of the Barcelona Underground with its driverless trains. The trip around Catalonia on five trains will let us enjoy a wide variety of landscapes, from the industrial cities around Barcelona to Montserrat, the symbolic mountain of Catalonia; period trains with carriages made of wood and vintage electric and steam locomotives. Our modeller friends of 10-inch gauge railways will treat us to an unbeatable demonstration of trains from three different circuits travelling along tracks in the middle of a park. Finally, and as an additional program, it will be possible to go to Núria, in the Pyrenees and close to the French border.

Fans of miniature trains will enjoy the first weekend in Esplugues with the TRAIN FESTIVAL, a get together with modular models of different scales and 5-inch gauge trains carrying passengers, as well as models by Sant Vicenç de Castellet Railroad Friends (ASVICAF) and the Barcelona Association of Railroad Friends.

We are pleased to invite you to participate in this event, your congress.

58th MOROP Congress Organising Committee.