Steam Express

Saturday : Lutyens Bungalow has declared summer. Breakfast is served on the terrace today even though we can see our exhaled breath at 7.30.  We walk up to the metro station and take an auto for the 20 minute ride to Cantonment railway station whence we have booked a ride on the 'Steam Express'. The auto driver tries to hold back on the change but D stands his ground and we just pay what we agreed. If he hadn't have got greedy he would have got a tip.

At the station WP 4-6-2 'Akbar' is ready at the head of the train in Platform 4. The sun is already very bright but we get some decent photos. It is all very low key, not at all like main line steam runs in the UK. Everybody is very friendly and D gets to climb up into the cab to see an exhibition of how to fire the loco. In the meantime R is ensconced in the rather ritzy Chair Car that is the passenger accommodation.  The other two coaches are a generator car and a Pantry car where food is prepared. 

A man and his assistant come round with a garland of marigolds each and a red dot for the forehead. For some reason D gets a few grains of rice placed on his red dot. Departure is only a couple of minutes late and after a steady start we pick up speed to around 90 kph. More attendants appear, with first a souvenir gift of a mug from the Railway Museum, then a bottle of water, followed by a breakfast tray with banana, sandwich and Litchi Juice. Reinforcements arrive with rissoles (?), hard boiled eggs and minted peas! No chai walla on this train but we do get a Shatabdi style tea kit and flask of hot water.

The schedule is not very demanding for this huge loco and the three coach train arrives at Rewari, about 70 km from our start,  nearly half an hour early. This gives us a chance to take a quick look at the Rewari Steam Shed,  where Indian Railways keeps some broad and metre gauge steam locomotives. It is only a few minutes walk from the end of the platform and is surrounded by a very well kept garden with attached loco shed. When Akbar is not working this is home. The Faery Queen, until recently the oldest working loco in the world, is also based here.

Our return to Delhi (DLI) in a conventional 2AC on a regular train is prosaic. We arrive 20 minutes late and D nearly gets us lost trying to find a half remembered short cut to the Metro Station. We just have time for a precise surgical strike on Haldiram's to buy a special type of sweet that Shukla has introduced us to. Then we take our last Metro trip back to Race Course and the packing. We need to come back within a year as we have 92 rupees credit left on our Metro cards which will expire otherwise.

Back at Lutyens we discover that D's parcel from Kolkata has not arrived. It might have stretched the packing a bit anyway. Dinner is also on the terrace, illuminated by candle light. We turn in early as we have flights to catch tomorrow.