Born and raised in a village with train halt, I have always been fascinated with the romance of chucking locomotives and shunting coaches. They were music to my ears which I don't get to hear any longer these days. To make a lame but lingering memory of yesteryears, thus far, I have amassed volumes of books, soundtracks, DVDs and paraphernalia about steam engines. The collection will grow but had I the money to build a miniature, I would, failing which it will surely be a major regret in life.
Puffing Billy making a pick-up stop at Menzie's Creek, first station after Belgrave, uphill.
So, I made it to Belgrave on the Dandenoong Ranges in Victoria to capture the Puffing Billy for the first time in my life. Lots of pictures and they make nice story and memory to at least please myself.
There are only two trips per day during autumn.
I almost missed the last train by minutes.
It's here that (ancora imparo) I learnt tourism, a major revenue earner for Victoria, can be run professionally by a bunch of retirees and young volunteers. There's so much of social integration and interaction to run an old railway track.
In the case of Puffing Billy, volunteers start from therank-and-file with on-the-job training as conductors, shop assistants, ttrain hosts, engine cleaners, booking clerks, museum operations workers, track workers, porter, as well as in work that involve engine repair and restoration, carriage repairs, and signals and telegraph.
Subsequently, volunteers must fter meet the required Board qualification before there are elevated to work in jobs as a Station Master, Guard, Signalman, Fireman, Ganger, Track Patrolman, Signal Fitter and Trolley Driver.
In other words, no short-cut even in volunteerism.
Puffing Billy, running on 2.6 narrow gauge, making a curve on trestle bridges.
And there's this good old signalising and track-shuffling system that never cease to wow me.
Kids, who are born to the age of bullet trains and MRT, must know who George Stephenson (1781 – 1848) was. Without the famous steam-powered locomotive named Rocket, there wouldn't have been a revolution in land transport. Stephenson created the rail gauge of 4 ft 8½ in (1435 mm), originally called "Stephenson gauge", and it has become the standard gauge for the majority of the world's railways.
This group of students, with legs danggling in the air, later had some trouble with the conductors.
Must be making enquiries about becoming Puffing Billy volunteers?
The Locomotive 14A that I rode on, which was built at the Victorian Railway's Newport workshop in 1914, was restored in 1996 for the Puffing Billy fleet. There are five others of the same make that still run in tip-top condition today. That's how a legacy has been preserved, and preserved productively to continue churning revenue for the State of Victoria.
This is just a preview. There's a full travelgue on this.
