Slow Train to Nowhere

All aboard the Savannahlander for a run into Queensland's Gulf country; where else could train passengers step down a moment to see a bird's nest or share the engine driver's cabin?

Anthills, scrub, and waving grass... the twin-carriage rail motor grinds to a halt on a deserted track. The engine-driver beckons his few passengers. A breakdown? No - he's inviting us to step down and see the love-nest of the Greater Bower Bird, surrounded by gleaming white gewgaws and shells.

Flashback to 1992. On a warm tropical evening in Cairns a small group boards two antique carriages sandwiched between freight wagons and flat bed cars. Instead of hermetically sealed windows and vinyl seats we find old-fashioned wooden slats and genuine leather. Neither sleepers nor dining car are provided - we're laden with sleeping bags and provisions for the next 36 hours.

Until 1993 "Mixed Goods 7A90" still climbed from Cairns up over the Great Dividing Range then south-west into the semi-arid 'outback' savannah country. After 423 kilometres the line petered out at the tiny township of Forsayth. Launched in 1995, the Savannahlander initially operated a tourist excursion from Mount Surprise to Forsayth, which again travels the length of the line, halting overnight at Almaden and at Mount Surprise, close by the Undara lava tubes.

Cairns, six in the morning. Two gleaming bullet heads rumble alongside: refurbished 1960-vintage rail motor units, basically an old-fashioned touring coaches on rails. As the sun comes up the Savannahlander rattles through quiet streets of stilted Queenslanders, worlds away from the 24 hour energy of Cairns' waterfront. Our route follows the popular tourist line climbing up through the rainforests, into the tunnels and across the ravines to Kuranda.

Joe Gillotti, porter and steward, points out the massive mango trees which are the hallmark of white settlement in north Queensland. Spreading flame trees enliven the streets of townships like Dimbulah, where signs point down dusty roads towards names like Wolfram or the Tyrconnell Gold Mine.

"Once we pass here, we're on our way. There'll be no-one ahead and no-one behind," remarks engine driver Paddy Inskip. Boulder-capped hilltops and the ubiquitous anthills soon announce the arid inland; trestle bridges stretch across the dry sandy riverbeds.

At the turn of the century the Forsayth-Chillagoe line was the largest private railway in Australia, hauling coal and ore across terrain rich in copper, gold, tin and wolfram, ancient, convoluted rocks spiced with garnets, rubies, sapphires and topaz. Lappa was the junction for the spur to the Mount Garnet mine, and here we spill out to meet 'Lappa Liz' - surnames mean nothing out here - who plans to restore the old wayside inn. She's gathered an eclectic collection of old pub signs, stirrups, hub caps, miners' picks and the like.

Kangaroos bound across the tracks; zebu cattle canter alongside. Black cockatoos wheel off through the ironwoods and bustards stalk between the termite mounds, which provided a source of iron and magnesium for Aborigines.

Almaden is quietly fading into oblivion. The century-old school has shut its doors, the pub doubles as postal agent and the ramshackle racetrack will close unless it can muster up more meetings. Crew and passengers alike make the dusty drive out to Chillagoe, where the chimneys of the ruined smelter add a human and historic dimension to a landscape of towering limestone profiles which shelter dry, cathedral-like caverns quite unlike the damp grottoes of cooler climes.

In the torpor of mid-afternoon we trundle into Einasleigh, a settlement basking above the Copperfield River gorge. Baby crocodiles inhabit the remaining pools in the sandy riverbed and rock wallabies skip nervously across the frozen pillows of basalt.

This outpost, too, has faded even further. The precariously-leaning store beside the pub has collapsed at last. Out of town the Kidston gold mine has closed in the face of falling gold prices. Gillotti's daughter rustles up afternoon teas at the one-room station. Just as well, since the pub, the only other amenity in town, is Closed For A Funeral.

Flashback to 1992. As the shadows lengthen we climb into the Newcastle Ranges, slowing to a crawl. Timid rock wallabies emerge from crevices, close enough to be fed. Just on sunset the train puts on a last rush of speed to clatter into Forsayth.

Tonight, however, we'll arrive hours late - whose job was it to check the fuel tank? Fortunately the Goldfields Tavern can still turn on a three-course dinner and tucks me up in the very same cabin in which I slept six years ago.

Forsayth still feels like the end of the line, a gold rush-era town trying to beat back the bush and the anthills which encroach on all sides. Not for years has there been a general store, but the school and the hospital are holding on. Squadrons of red-tailed black cockatoos invade at dawn, staking out the telephone wires, setting up command posts in the hotel garden.

Up on Castle Rock, a sandstone crag whose sheltered hollows bear the fading stencils of long-gone aboriginal hands, we gaze out over the scrubby ranges of the Gulf Country, already baking under a harsh sky. It is difficult to visualise the heady days of the 1860s on the Etheridge gold field when settlements mushroomed across the arid ranges and every inch of land was staked out in claims and mining leases.