Ambarawa rail tour a real adventure

Ambarawa rail tour a real adventure

Bambang M, Contributor, Ambarawa, Central Java

As the whistle blew, the old funicular locomotive and its two
cars resembling the ones in cowboy movies jerked to life and
began to move noisily.

Slowly it pulled away from the train station in Ambarawa, one
of the oldest in Java having been built in 1873, heading for the
nearby Bedono station.

"It will take us about an hour to get to Bedono, which is
located some 10 kilometers southwest of here," said Sudono, head
of the Ambarawa station, the tour guide of the day.

It was an unsurprisingly long journey, considering that the
cars were almost 100 years old -- they were first operated in
1907.

"In Indonesia, you can find funicular trains in only two
places now. One is in Bukittinggi, West Sumatra, and the other is
here in Ambarawa," Sudono said.

The train in Bukittinggi is used to carry charcoal, while in
Ambarawa the train is for tourists looking for a unique
adventure. The passengers on this day were teachers and employees
from the Stella Maris high school in Surabaya.

After passing some traditional houses, the train entered the
region of Jambu, where the passengers could enjoy beautiful
village scenery. Farmers were working in their green fields with
Mt. Merbabu in the distance as a backdrop. Off in the distance
was the shimmering water of Lake Rawa Pening.

At the Jambu train station, which is about four kilometers
away from Ambarawa, the train stopped. From that point, it starts
its climb and begins to provide the passengers with the true
adventure of the Ambarawa mountain tour.

"We stop here for a while to give the train crew time to move
the locomotive to the rear of the train in order to prevent the
train from derailing," Sudono said.

In a few minutes, the train was ready to move again. The
locomotive pushed the cars up the mountain and the funicular
system began to be operated. Now the passengers began to feel the
jolts and bumps.

The funicular system is what makes the German-made locomotive
special, because this is what prevents the train from derailing.

"Without the funicular system, the locomotive would not be
able to climb the steep rail and would just derail," Sudono said.

As it climbed, the train produced hissing noises and thick
smoke poured out of its chimney. The train crew added more wood
to the train stove.

Some of the passengers took a mini-tour to see how the
locomotive worked, while others were mesmerized by the view along
the railway, where numerous kinds of trees grew and village
children ran back and forth.

"I'm very happy," Dion, an elementary school student taking
part in the tour, exclaimed in excitement as the train passed
through a tunnel.

After climbing for some 45 minutes, the train arrived at its
destination, the Bedono train station, which is located 711
meters above sea level.

The passengers took a rest for a while to enjoy the scenery
and eat some nasi pecel (rice served with various vegetables and
peanut sauce).

At the same time, the train also had time to take a short
rest. Climbing for 232 meters had surely exhausted the old
machine. The train crew filled it with 2,850 liters of water for
the journey back to Ambarawa.

The locomotive was put back in its original position at the
front of the cars for the return journey. The funicular system
was again in operation as the train moved down the hill. To
reduce the pushing power of the two cars behind the locomotive,
the manual brakes on both of the cars were operated.

The tour ended when the train arrived at the Ambarawa train
station.

Sudono said the Ambarawa-Bedono route was formerly part of the
Semarang-Yogyakarta route that opened in 1901. But the route was
closed in 1975 because it was not profitable. The mountain
railway tour itself, he said, started in 1976.

"We used to have many foreign visitors before the Bali
bombings and the SARS scare. Now our visitors are mostly domestic
tourists, especially children," he said.