PIERRE DE WET IN NAMIIBIA

Posted on 09 October 2009 by Railways Africa Editor

Following a month in Namibia, Pierre de Wet reports enthusiastically on a number of well-kept stations:

“Down south at Aus on the Lüderitz line there is a large depot with concrete sleepers in neat stacks including those fancy see-through ones that Railways Africa published some time ago. Brave people resuscitating this very difficult line. Apart from this large track and sleeper depot, the old German railway station still stands together with a motley array of goods trucks in the station precinct. A very nice little hotel overlooks the station called Bahnhof Hotel.”

“Visited the Windhoek Railway Museum where Konrad Schullenbach showed my wife and me around. It is good to see this museum occupying most of the top floor of the Windhoek station building, thereby putting this fine building to good use where it would otherwise have stood empty. This museum is well worth a visit, having a large number of interesting artefacts on display together with some fine photographs.

“The yards at Windhoek were all but deserted with no movement to be seen on a lovely morning. A far cry from the bustle of the fifties with the engine shed about a hundred metres from the platform and teeming with class 24s, 8s and 7s with shunting going on all over the show and the yards usually filled with passenger coaches and goods trucks. Of course many railway staff were also to be seen as well as the public coming and going on railway-related business.

“Okahandja was also quiet – no trains but the historic old station building built by the Germans still stands. Unfortunately, this is more a place for loafing in the shade for many and no sense of urgency is to be found, or indeed of anything railway-related. Meanwhile, big trucks rumble and grunt their way [on the road] through the town all the time. The railway is disappointing perhaps but not Okahandja’s biltong and droëwors. This made me forget the trains.

“Visited the family farm at Wilhelmstal just this side of Karibib where we crossed what seemed like 95lb track on good ballast. Stopped at Karibib station on our way to Swakopmund where a train drawn by red and grey Chinese diesels was standing. It was empty but the diesel was throbbing and staff were around. It was called ‘the Desert Express”. Cream and brown livery, Union Carriage coaches. Again, the original German station still stands, nicely preserved and serves as a restaurant.

“Saw no trains at Swakopmund”, de Wet continues, adding that the distinctive German-styled former station in the town, now a hotel, has been refurbished recently in the African style.

“Had supper in the old tug Danie Hugo on the foreshore. This has been converted into a fine restaurant but it looked much better moving shipping in Table Bay Harbour back in the 50/60s. On our way north along the coast to Henties Bay at Vlotska Baken, I saw one seaside home there constructed partly of a narrow gauge vehicle. This has been there for many years and has surprisingly survived.

“On to Etosha which costs an arm and a leg nowadays and then out again to see a goods train from Tsumeb cantering along with a single dirty red class 33 SA diesel on the new railway line north. After a night in Tsumeb it was on to Grootfontein where again, no trains were to be seen, but evidence of Grootfontein’s importance as railhead during the Angolan war in the largish yards with plenty of overhead yard lights.

“Travelling south again, another very smoky SA diesel on a train of tankers was passed near Otavi, a run-down little town near some copper mines where the making of mosquito nets is its second largest industry. Went along to the station to have a look and saw a few tank wagons and a dilapidated, 1950s style SAR station building – ugly and utilitarian.
Turned around and headed towards Otjiwarongo – a much more attractive town.

“After arriving back in Windhoek the next day and passing a goods train swinging around the curves to Okahandja we drove on to Gobabis. For many years as a youngster, I had watched the class sevens to and from Gobabis trundling past my home and once my wife had taken the overnight mixed to that town back in the 50s. I longed to be in one of the four wooden saloons behind the clanking goods wagons on the overnight train as it panted past our home on a long embankment but never managed it. We decided to trace its route to that Kalahari town and to overnight there.

“The climbing track through Klein Windhoek was now ballasted and heavier rail was in place. It is a tremendous climb out of the Namibian capital and all the way to the airport is hilly country which required the use of two locomotives, one banking. At last, at Windhoek International Airport, the first sign of level ground and a string of avgas tankers at the pumps. This is probably the main load on the line these days. The line continued into yet another thunderstorm with Kameeldoring savanna etched against dark clouds. Then a sign – ‘You are entering CATTLE COUNTRY!’ And the large ranches of the Gobabis district and their main export, beef, swept into view.

“And the railway line? This had now deteriorated into very light track set in sand, looking exactly as it had 50 years ago. No more cattle by rail – so what does this line still carry? Very little I’d have to say. The station and yards at Gobabis were deserted with only two grey DZs next to the goods shed. The station building looked good, nicely painted and looking as if it was waiting for the next train to arrive. The yards, extending quite far beyond the station, with yard lighting, were completely empty and probably have been ever since the cattle trains stopped running. It was more a museum than anything else.

“So the next morning after breakfast, we left this town where my wife’s father had once run the Gobabis Hotel back in the forties, and sallied southwards along the Nossob River bordering the Kalahari Transfrontier Park. We passed farms visited long ago and then began the tiring trek from Mariental (no trains) to Keetmanshoop. One train stopped in section with cement wagons just outside Keetmans with two of the Chinese diesels.

“Grünau hotel that night and many memories rekindled of stopping opposite the same hotel 50 years ago and watching people happily drinking on a hot stoep with American farm bakkies parked in front. They used to chase our train, the farmers, until it grew too dark and then they’d turn around in a cloud of dust, hooting. Probably saying goodbye to someone on the train. That night I heard the grumble of a diesel passing on the 60lb track. No different from all those years ago although the track has been upgraded round Windhoek and on to Swakopmund.

“And so, the next day we crossed the Orange River into the bone dry Richtersveld and it was au revoir to Namibia.”