Steam & Excursion > India Steam - Darjeeling

Today's country is India. In November 2016 I joined a tour that covered most of the Darjeeling line in northern India. The Darjeeling Himalayan Railway (DHR) was completed in 1881 and is 55 miles in length. Tourist passenger service is provided regularly only on the top end of the line from Darjeeling to Guam, a distance of four miles. The rest of the line sees irregular service, mostly diesel worked. At the time of our visit, there was a daily diesel hauled passenger train between Darjeeling and Kuresong. The steam locos are all B Class dating from 1882 with 14 currently rostered. Our tour mostly utilized No. 1 "Tindhara" as it was the strongest loco available having been rebuilt from an ill fated oil fired experiment in 2003. 

This has to rank as one of the top steam experiences of my life. Participants had the choice of riding the train or following by cars with Indian driver, three participants to a vehicle.  As a mileage collector, that was a difficult choice.  On some days we had two trains. One steam, the other diesel with an open platform car on the rear where we could photography and video the steam train following closely. With so many photos to choose from, I've broken my "best photo by country" rule and decided to post two. The first is a typical Darjeeling scene with the railway closely following the Hill Cart Road, close to homes and businesses. This was the first freight train, albeit it only for demonstration purposes, over the line in many years as the wagons were only recently restored. The second photo was taken at the Batasia Loop with Mt. Kanchenjunga, the World's third highest, in the background. The loco is No. 806 "Queen of the Hill."   Another first on this tour was that we were the first passenger train to cover the entire line in 7 years. Due to it's location and annual monsoon season, the line suffers frequent land slips and closures. Tomorrow: Isle of Man. 

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'Looks like the old coal burners have been replaced.  I've traveled that route twice, once in 1967 and again in 1994.  'Lots of cinders in the eyes and on on my clothes... LOL.  It was a good eight-hour trip from Siliguri to Darjeeling.  Definitely a different world.

The mountain with snow in the background of the last image is the Kangchenjunga, the third highest peak in the world at 28,169 ft.  Darjeeling is about 7,000 ft,

Greg Stadter
Phoenix, AZ

Hi Greg. All locos are still coal burning. The No. 1 that we used on our charter had been converted to oil but was converted back to coal I assume because of poor performance.