OK, not strictly 4x4 but it’s certainly travel and a slice of history passing in front of our eyes.
I’m unashamedly Mallee raised spending my formative years in
Mildura. Right up until the 90’s, the railway system was the lifeblood of the Mallee and for us Majoora-ites, the best form of public transport down to the ‘Big Smoke’. Leaving at 9:30 p.m. the Vinelander passenger service would pull out of
Mildura station for an overnight trip down to
Melbourne.
Many a school trip was taken on the Vinelander as were trips to visit relatives during the school holidays. On many occasions across the 60’s and 70’s, the nights spent in the compartments of the red rattler carriages or the newer saloon cars in the 70’s were exciting adventures for we kids.
In the 80’s when I took up a Govt job in
Melbourne, you were occasionally provided with a “roomette” in the sleeper car. What service with the bed made, breakfast and the paper delivered and even the shoes polished if you left them out. What an experience and one that’s all but disappeared from the modern travel experience with cut price airfares and buses replacing rail.
I always lamented the loss of the Vinelander and all passengers
services to
Mildura in the 1990’s. It was a travel experience you can only find on the long hauls across Australia these days.
Why do I wax lyrical about this, well the ‘Operations 707’ group, otherwise known as the Newport Rail Preservation Society are conducting a weekend train trip to Murrayville on 21-22 July to Farwell the old Murrayville Branch line that is being lost due to the Murray Basin rail standardisation project.
As guardians of much of the retired V-Line rolling stock, it will be a trip down memory lane (or rail line) with the old twinette, roomette, dining and saloon cars all being put back into service for the occasion. The trip will head up to Ouyen before heading out to Murrayville for a celebration and dinner at the pub before commencing the trip
home.
This is doubly memorable for me as I spent a few years working in Ouyen and as I was dating a girl whose dad was head of the Ouyen Loco office, I had the chance to spend many a day travelling various branch lines across the Mallee at the pointy end of a loco hauling 5000 tonnes or more of grain and goods.
Like many so much in this day and age, the old things are passing but this is one little piece of history I’m going to be a part of.
Details are here;
Farewell to Murrayville Branch Line
Cheers and all aboard…..Mick.
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Richard Maurice - 1903Lifetime Member
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