Open Writing

A heartfelt letter in the Sunday paper from a reader in Scotland bemoaning the loss of South African passenger trains caught my eye. Recalling earlier days, I’d like to add my memories and echo the frustration felt by residents and overseas visitors at the loss of this agreeable form of travel. Tourists from all over the world found countrywide travel, and journies as far as the Victoria Falls, a lifetime experience. For nearly fifty years this was one of the most popular ‘extras’ offered by the big tourist organisations. In the days before widespread motor travel, trains were the only way to cover the African distances and thousands cherish similar images of journeys they’ve enjoyed.

The mail train to Cape Town pulls up at a drab station and glimpsed from a comfortable compartment the bored travellers stare at the colourful crowd. From the guard’s van two wicker baskets of carrier pigeons, six cardboard boxes of day-old chicks, three bicycles and four mail sacks are offloaded; milk-churns clatter. Porters shouting “Mind yer baaacks!” push trolleys heavily loaded with suitcases pasted with hotel and steamer labels. Food and drink sellers move up and down offering koeksusters, lollies, peanuts, fruit and cold drinks. Passengers climb warily to the platform to stretch their legs. One returns triumphantly waving a “Diamond Fields Advertiser”. Now the ‘lounge-lizards’ can catch up with the morning’s news from Kimberley and the Orange Free State.

A group of mineworkers from the Transkei loudly compare notes from their rural kraals. Facing the terrors of going underground again, they boast of their skills, chant and stamp, their cowrie shell anklets chittering in time to their movements. One has a bright red scarf around his head and a guitar with a broken string over his shoulder, another in a Panama hat without a crown is carrying his ritual ox-hide shield and short stabbing spear. Waiting quietly at one side, a young mother unfastens her abba and slinging her baby from her back, opens her blouse to feed her child, smiling timidly at the noisy men, anxious not to attract their attention.

The jerking minute hand on the large station clock moves up to the hour. The station master raises his green flag waiting for the signal. Down it goes, he blows his whistle, the train lets out a blast of steam and slowly pulls away. Last goodbyes are shouted, handkerchiefs waved and the crowd disperses. As the train gathers speed, two young men with strong English accents talk excitedly. “Nice to see Jack Thompson again, wasn’t it? He’s a member of the Steam Train Preservation Society in Britain. First met him booking his seat at Victoria Station. Been all over the world; just loves trains. He’s ridden the Ghan from Sydney to Perth, the Oriental Express from Rangoon to the interior and the Pacific United from coast to coast in America. But most of all he loves the South African trains. Says they’ve got a atmosphere of their own. Makes a point of visiting the big rail junction at De Aar whenever he can to take photos. Says it’s a library of railway history and many of them should be in a museum, they’re so valuable.''

The gong sounds for ‘first service’ and mothers tell children to tidy up, while dads whisper “Off to have a beer”, escaping the rowdy turmoil to the bar in the air-conditioned observation car and a discussion of the latest rugby scores. Reluctantly abandoning the favoured upper bunk where he’s been riding the heavy green leather bolster, little Harry follows his mother and sister to the restaurant car, filled with the appetising smells of vegetable soup and roast chicken with ice-cream to follow. The Head Steward leads them to a table for four, laid with silver cutlery and SAR embossed crockery, and mother carefully pours glasses of iced water for the kids, instructing them not to spill a drop on the heavily starched white tablecloth.

Watching through the wide windows as the sun sinks and shadows creep over the land the kids see meercats scattering to their burrows, as tumbleweed blows across the empty lands. Telephone poles sag under the huge sociable weavers’ nests while owls wait for the first mouse to venture from his hole. The Karroo night begins.

The next day the train pulls into the quaint Victorian station of Matjiesfontein, dominated by the Lord Milner Hotel. Started by an enterprising Scot who’d obtained the concession to operate refreshment stations from the Cape to the Victoria Falls, it embodies everything that was considered fashionable at the time and was known to travellers all over the world who stayed to enjoy the benefits of the invigorating Karroo air.

Soon the scenery changes from the flat emptiness of the Karroo ringed with distant blue mountains, and the exciting descent begins. Passengers crane out of the windows watching the train, “two-up” with another engine pushing from the back, labouring up the steep gradients of the Hex River pass. They remember the sounds of the midnight wheel-tapper’s hammer checking the wheels at De Aar junction; the muttered words that woke them from a comfortable sleep, snugly tucked between smooth sheets and dark blue blankets and the smell of train smoke lingering in their nostrils.

Extensive vineyards herald the approach to Paarl, ‘the jewel of the Cape’ where large boxes of delicious export grapes are for sale. Then at last, the arrival at Cape Town station where a blustery South-Easter greets them. Tingling in the nostrils, with a smell of kelp and the stink of the fishing boats from the harbour it tantalises with its promise of sea bathes and sand-castles, fresh peaches and fine wines. Draped in its summer mantle Table Mountain watches the yachts surging through the waves as the Atlantic breakers crash in a roll of spray against the quay.

Straining against the hawsers, the massive bulks of the lavender-hulled Union-Castle mailships rock in the surge. Getting them away from the dockside and positioned for the open sea is going to be a tricky business. It’ll take three tugs and all the skills of these experienced seamen to accomplish the manoeuvre safely’.

For many overseas tourists and thousands of former Rhodesians and South Africans train journeys like these formed some of their most vivid experiences and the memories stayed with them all their lives. Compared to queues, security checks, crowded aircraft cabins and homogenised food, who wouldn’t rather travel by train and make it part of your holiday?