MOT Tour Day 44 - West Coast Wilderness Railway

This was a highly anticipated journey today and one of two reasons we were drawn to the west coast of Tasmania - the West Coast Wilderness Railway.

Based normally in Queenstown and Strahan, it has been operating a train from each base until the last few days, when a derailment by the Strahan train put the line out of action until the cause can be fully investigated. In fact, going back a few years, damage to the track caused the twin services to be created. Before then, it was an all day ride from either Queenstown or Strahan, the full length of the line. 

This is a wonderful organisation who manage the only real thing going for Queenstown with a high degree of professionalism. It's not cheap and because of our "we ain't coming back" approach to this tour, first class known as the Wilderness Carriage, was even not cheaper! It was worth every Seniors discount cent.

It was a misty start this morning, with accompanying drizzle, giving the train and its No 5 locomotive an air of mysterious days gone by. Steam and mist rolled around the engine and the usual selection of shady characters in expansive dresses with flash hats or long dark coats buttoned and drawn together by belt secured in one hastily tied half knot, could be seen waiting impatiently on the platform. Each face held a story or the chapter of a story or at least a Facebook post.

Of course, Sue just saw a lot of people unremarkably, warmly dressed for a train trip.

The trip started with bubbly and a clanking kilometre later, the conversations were underway. Sue thought the guy in the Panama hate was a spy. I said, be careful, his bowtie is really a camera.

The other people at our table may have had real estate there in their bag because they were strangely subdued in the conversation.

The view outside was beginning to become a deeply layered pastiche of green, as ferns dominated with wide displays of fronds, creating canopies from the rain. Cool temperate rainforest completely overtook the environment: little wonder when 40% of Tasmania is this type of vegetation. It was lush, it was dense, it was a beautiful cooling green and it was loving the prevailing conditions allowing it to put its best frond forward.

Our little engine which could was starting to prove the benefit of the rack and pinion system which supported it up the steep slopes we had begun to climb. Rack and pinion sounds like a dish in  a restaurant where you tip your waiter by card. To understand it, imagine a third rail running down the centre of the track or look at the photos linked here-in and your imagination can have the day off. This is no ordinary string of steel. Where as the two outside rails are virtually smooth and shaped to take steam powered wheels, this is a series of raised bumps, rather like someone has taken a cog from an old time clock and shaped it from the circular to the linear. On the engine above the track are two wheels with the same pattern. As the steam turns them, they mesh with the rail and traction for 26 tonnes of engine, pulling 50 tonnes of carriages, is assured. Coming downhill under load safely is greatly enhanced.

We made several stops at little stations, each with their own opportunities to further understand the life and times that the engines, in particular, came from and to help tell the story of the creation of the railway. Sue went gold panning at one stop, complete with a walkthrough of of a museum displaying all aspects of the life of a gold miner. There was no mention of gold adults.

At another there was a theatrical example of a mine, complete with timbers shoring the entrance and tunnel, fuel lanterns and a skip on rails. Unfortunately, the tunnel was flooded with up to 30cm of water, making ingress impossible but as pointed out by our carriage steward, all the more authentic.

Each stop, of course, enabled the engine staff to top up the engine with water to make the hot, white stuff than was providing the grunt to climb the hill.

King River Gorge

The Queen River ran beside us with much enthusiasm, engorged by days of rain but it left soon after the first stop at Lynchford. Here the serious climbing started, at times 1 in 8 but consistently 1 in 16, making it the steepest gradient on any track in Australia. After the next stop at Rinadeena, the bridges started coming thick and fast as the mountains above us offered steep, rutted slopes than required bridges to ford the spurs. However, not far from our turning point, the most glorious of landscape views opened up beside us, in the form of the King River Gorge and the combined waters of the King and Queen roared down the its sharp vee. Across the narrow valley, more mountains loomed, some of them exceeding 300 metres and their heads wearing foggy hats. They were covered with dense trees: unrepentant in the face of the previous threat of homo sapiens and their axes. 

At our last outgoing stop, we had the treat of watching the engine being transferred from front to tail or was that tail to front? Either way, watching it reverse up to the turntable and then the driver and stoker pushing it around by dint of muscle power and then shunt back in the opposite direct and be latched securely to the carriages, was grand. More so, apparently, for the lady that stood in front of me as I shot video of the procedure. 

All the while, they fed us and watered us and provided a running commentary on the history of the railway. This was somewhat in need of an edit as it was a little wordy at times but hey, you can't knock people with passion and enthusiasm and a love of where they live and what they do. In the main, it was really interesting. My particular favourite yarn was the story of the five engines who have served the railway. #1 & 2, did so with distinction. Both were imported from Glasgow, with #1 arriving in pieces and with no instructions. Hey, we've all had those boxes of Lego! #2 was sunk on the Grafton in Macquarie Harbour. Many of the pieces washed up on the shore and based on comparison to #1, the missing bits were ordered from Glasgow. #3 was a dud but not as bad as #4, who was so bad that they drove it into a quarry and blew the walls apart to bury it. #5 was still do the business in front of us.

Click here for today's photos.

You travel in groups of four: two on either side of the table. Our companions were charming and interesting and good conversationalists. 

Great day.

Strahan tomorrow and the Gordon River Cruise.