A train named ‘Desert’

An air of romance, a hint of mystery and three days on Trans-Siberian, long distances by train has always had this side ‘journey into the trip, “where the important is not the destination but rather the journey itself. True to the transcontinental line, the Ghan is no exception. It even adds an extra dose of exoticism: the desert, which will, for the next three days, a place of contemplation tireless behind the shutters of the luxurious cabins and overhead.

Boarding ends, the whistle is given and, slowly, the twenty wagons pulled by two locomotives red sparkling start road. The skyscrapers of Adelaide are already a memory, quickly swept away by the excitement of crossing the Outback, the desert hinterland, and to borrow a line become a legend. About 3,000 km of bush to go and the Darwin Tropical us, after having languished for nearly 140 years for Ghan finally happening, thus the ambitious dream of a train linking Australia from north to south, crossing the sacred heart, the desert.

“Camel Train”

The history of the Ghan is long and folk. Promise and abandoned on several occasions, the idea of creating a route between Darwin and Adelaide obsessed pioneers for generations. Appointed to the origin the Afghan Express, the route follows the train route in the nineteenth and early twentieth by herds of camels, called Camel trains.

Led by camel from Afghanistan and north-western India, between 6000 and 10 000 camels were imported from these distant lands for their resistance to arid desert. Used since 1860 for mining and pastoral as well as for transporting passengers and goods, these animals greatly facilitated the exploration of the desert and contributed to the difficult construction of the Ghan line.

After opening in 1872 the Telegraph Station Alice Springs in the heart of the Red Center, the authorities decided to build a rail line serving the north and south shores of the country to allow, since Darwin, the shipment of goods to Asian markets. The laying of rails in 1878 began to arrive in 1929 to a railway to Alice Springs. But the Great Depression went by and the construction of the net was stopped due to lack of resources, halfway only Darwin. Alice Springs became the terminus of the Ghan.

For sixty-five years exactly, nothing happened. So much so that the people of the Territory Northwest, tired of hoping, called the Never-never the line. Until this February morning in 2004 when the Ghan said his path to sink to the tropical north and 24 hours later, enter triumphantly into the newly created Station Darwin. This maiden voyage marks the end of this interminable site, probably one of the last buildings of transcontinental railroad on the planet.

Several meetings over a gourmet meal – used in the car very sixties the restaurant – and one night later, we open our eyes, amazed by the décorqui scrolls behind the window. The land of golden grain plains of South Australia has given way to intense ocher desert center.

At Infinity, a red soil, dunes and rocky ledges, colonized by Spinifex, the plant covered with thorns adapted to arid soils. First oasis, and the first stop since leaving Alice Springs, nestled in the heart of the Massif des MacDonnell Ranges.

Bisected by the Todd River, drained continuously, the town itself has no great interest, and alcohol and wreaked havoc on some of the Aboriginal community. For most travelers, the city is also a step, a point of departure to other destinations like Mount Uluru (Ayers Rock the mythical).

Retro and kitsch

Step Alice Springs is continuing with the Old Ghan Museum, in the old station of the city. Retro and kitsch, this small museum in the journey continues the journey by visiting the cars of first Ghan. Black leather banquettes, wooden shutters and obsolete locomotive plunges the visitor in 30 years, at first intercontinental voyages.

Then, the journey was as fantastic and memorable as possible and cancellations were often the common lot of travelers. Thus, the successive floods of the Finke River rocked over half a century Ghan journeys. Until Railways Commonwealth decided in 1974 to stop these random crossings in radically changing the route of the railway and implementing rail gauge greater, allowing the passage of freight trains .

The old Ghan made his last trip in 1980, abandoned stations and relays ridden time. The ancient track, reduced to the status of the runway, is now the gateway to destinations extremes of the Outback.

The Sacred Way

Evening: At that time the sun begins to fall on “The Alice”, the Ghan takes its way to the tropical north. The time to find travel companions. A strange sensation as the microcosm rail. We welcome discreetly, it is found, we cross, we meet around a meal …

Our associates come from Adelaide, Sydney, Melbourne, but also of Korea, the Netherlands or England … The Ghan is a myth, certainly Australia, but its originality is absolutely borderless. And since it leads to Darwin, it is still not.

The ultimate railway, leading from Alice Springs to Darwin, was relaunched in 1997 and its implementation discussed at length between traditional owners and civil engineers. Installed in full aboriginal territory, in places where each tree, each mineral or stream have a meaning in the ‘Dreaming’, this route along 1420 km necessitated extensive consultation conducted under the leadership of the Aboriginal Councils and Center North and the Authority for the protection of Aboriginal Areas (AAPA).

Pathways and barriers were negotiated on a case by case and laying rails, less flexible, was permitted under strict conditions.

Last hour drive. The desert place one last time the red carpet. Tomorrow, the Ocher of the Outback will have given way to deep green vegetation of the tropical “Top End”.

Tomorrow, the palm will replace the Spinifex and we find the hubbub of the city. In compartments, the sounds are silent to leave one last time, to express the majestic silence of the desert.

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