I sat behind an old timer on the train over the weekend talking about how coffins used to come on the trains to Glen Eden.
When first opened, one of Glen Eden station’s functions was to service the nearby Waikumete Cemetery. Special trains ran from Auckland on Sundays carrying the deceased and their entourage, and a dedicated platform was constructed to serve these trains. The coffins were carried in special carriages marked with white crosses.
And for a bit of spooky fun, this is what the moonslipper says about the trains and haunted cemeteries.
Waikumete Cemetery, Glen Eden, New Zealand
Waikumete Cemetery covers nearly 306 acres and has been open since 1886. Over 700,000 souls are buried here including many victims of the 1918 Spanish Influenza epidemic, 19 New Zealand murderers hung and buried in unmarked graves at an area known as Murderers Grove and the unknown victims of the Air New Zealand flight to Antartica which crashed in 1979. The older part of Wikumete Cemetery is where the majority of the paranormal activity happens. The Chapel of Faith, which was built as a mortuary chapel, is haunted by a woman in black and figures are regularly seen drifting in and around the old gravestones. Glen Eden Train station nearby had special trains that ran on Sundays carrying the bodies of those who had died and their entourages. The cafe at the train station is said to be haunted by Alex McFarland who worked there in the early 1900’s and was killed in a freak work accident on the platform. Most recently, a man in an old fashioned top hat entered the cafe, asked for a timetable and, when the waitress turned away, vanished into thin air. A memorably spooky location.