The International Steam Pages


Steam on the EAR, 2011

This account of the events in and around Nairobi in May 2011 was originally posted on the East Africa Yahoo newsgroup by Thomas Kautzor, it is unchanged except for correcting a few 'typos'. See also James Waite's report and Geoff Warren's insider comments on the same trip.


Day 1 was to be a trip from Naivasha to Nairobi (111 km) behind 3020. The train consist was to comprise 4 goods wagons, 2 coaches and 1 caboose. The train turned out to be 2 goods wagons short of that, one of the two remaining being the notorious water tank wagon. The train had gone from Nairobi to Naivasha the previous day and was ready to depart on Thursday morning. It promptly did so after a couple of runpasts in the station. However, shortly thereafter we had to stop several times because of viscosity problems with the firing oil, and then to cross an UP goods train. Some of these unplanned delays were turned photo stops, however it resulted in us getting too late to the much-heralded photo location with Mt. Longonot and another volcano in the background for the loco to be in perfect light. However these were uncontrollable events and at the end of the day everyone seemed to be quiet happy.

On Day 2 we were to have 5918 positioned at the West end of the train (10 wagons, 2 coaches, 1 restaurant car, 1 caboose) for some pictures at 07.00, before departing to Konza (75 km), from where we were to return in the afternoon with photo stops between there and Athi River. The evening before we were told that we would only be able to depart Nairobi after arrival of the last morning commuter train from the East, but were told that we would use the time for some more pictures within Nairobi station. When I got to the station at around 07.15, 5918 was nowhere to be seen, nor any smoke from it coming from the workshops. As has been reported earlier, it only came out of the workshops at around 11.00 and then went to stand on platform 1 to wait for the fuel truck. At first that truck was to wait for us at Makadara, but then someone called for it to come to Nairobi station to fuel the loco there. As we were waiting for it we were told that it was probably stuck in Nairobi's notorious traffic, but 4 hours to cover the 5 km distance between Makadara and Nairobi would still appear to be a record. Once the truck finally appeared, the loco was fueled just in time to clear track 1 for the afternoon commuter trains. By then it was already too late
to go anywhere out on the line, so we just had a short shunting session in the yard. Obviously the loco could have been fueled a day, a week or even a month before that day.

As a result of the precious day's events, Day 3's program (return trip to Makadara with 5918 in the morning and 2409 in the afternoon) was shuffled around. We were to go to Makadara behind 2409 at daybreak (this was a Saturday with no commuter trains to deal with) and make some photos in the morning light while returning to Nairobi. Once there, we were to immediately leave to either Konza or Stony Athi behind 5918, which we were assured would be kept ready for us. As we got to the station in the morning, no sign of 2409, which appeared late and we only departed for Makadara at 07.50. As a result of more delays
while running around the train at Makadara and at photo stops, we only got back to Nairobi at 11.20, where 5918 was said to be waiting for us, ready to depart to Stony Athi. However, as we got there, there was no Garratt in sight. 2409 then sat in the yard waiting for 5918, which only came out late in the afternoon. Apparently its fire had been dropped over night and was only lit back on at 09.30, the time at which we should have taken off behind it. The two locos were then positioned next to each other for us to take some photos of the two side-by-side, before coupled onto the train (which consisted of the water tank, the two third class passenger coaches, the restaurant car, the motor van and three caboose) for a brake test. The brake test then lasted over an hour before departure at 16.19. At that point of time part of the Tanago group had left the train to return to the hotel, a good decision in retrospect. Although we stopped at Makadara, instead of running around and returning to Nairobi in order to get at least one photo of 5918 at the right end of the train before nightfall, it was decided to proceed. Shortly thereafter we had to stop in the middle of a slum as the boiler pressure had dropped. Luckily for us, slum dwellers in Kenya are friendlier than in some other parts of the world. After the pressure was back up to 100 PSI we proceeded only to stop 200 meters further on as it had again dropped to below 60 PSI. At that point we abandoned the train and walked to the nearby Nairobi-Mombasa road bridge, from where we were picked up by bus.

The program for the tour was certainly kept very simple in order to increase chances for success, yet after Day 1 it still turned into a disaster. I sincerely hope that there is a future for steam tours to Kenya and that other tour operators will also be able to run tours there, however for this to happen lessons will have to be learned from the failures of this tour.


Rob Dickinson

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