Sugar, Steam & Sunsets in Java

Today’s presentation, by Dave Longman, , entitled “Sugar, Steam and Sunsets in Java”, turned out to be something of a complete surprise to everyone attending. This was really Dave’s account of his tours of the country in the early years of this century.  The “steam” involved was on his visits to several of the sugar mills and plantations set throughout Java. The majority of the steam locos we saw were over eighty years old and some well over a hundred, and all had spark arresters fitted for working in to the mills and plantations, where the temperatures were high and everywhere very dry. The engines were not in a particularly good state of repair but were kept running. Most ran on Bagas, this is a bale of leaves and waste wood and produced very little smoke.

His journey from mill to mill was by bus, bicycle and becak - an adapted bicycle similar to a rickshaw but in this case the passengers sat in digger-style bucket on the front of the bike. Dave also used other forms of transport including car, pillion on a motor bike and mini bus where he was accompanied by various animals and chickens. Almost anyone would do anything for cigarettes or money, this was how he obtained many cab rides on the locos or get into the sheds and mills for photographs. Being an industrial system, all running was very slow so he was able jump off the engine, get in front of it to take his pictures and hop back on. The same applied when running alongside a road. We saw unusual sanding methods for when a loco slips - these engines just had a man on the front buffer beam with a bucket of sand.

During the afternoon we also witnessed the inside of a live volcano, paddy fields, amazing landscapes and heard some exceptional stories about a totally different way of living. During the interval we were grateful to our three ladies for supplying us a tasty Christmas buffet.

Dave Elsdon

Branch Secretary