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Çamlık Outdoor Railway Museum

Foreword

The Çamlık outdoor museum was inaugurated in 1991 just as steam was phased out from Turkey. It has one of the largest steam engines collection in Europe, most them joining the museum shortly after being retired from service. The museum is perfectly located, a few minutes away from Turkey most famous historical site: Ephesus. It sits on the premises of the former Çamlık station, now disused because of a realignment of the Izmir Aydın main line. All the original buildings have been retained, including the small three tracks engine shed that housed the banking engines in the era of steam.

Çamlık station is on the former ORC line, the oldest line in Turkey. It is at the summit of the most difficult part of the line, with steep gradient and sharp curves.

The museum is under new management since 1999 and has been very much improved since. All the engines have been repainted and the junkyard that was formerly in front of the station building has been cleared. The gardening is very nice and the museum has been enclosed using old railway ties. In 2001, the engine shed has been cleaned up and all the tools are now neatly presented. The collection has been enlarged on several occasion in a wize attempt by TCDD to gather in Camlık rolling stock that was previously scattered around the country.

For lunch, I would recommend to eat the local specialty: the "çöp şiş", a sort of miniature shish kebab. Any restaurant in Çamlık will do, the one nearest to the museum is fine.

Palm trees provide a much needed shadow in summer time. August 2009. Photo JP Charrey

Track layout map showing museum location over the former Çamlık station and shed tracks

Address

Access

By car from Selçuk: exit Selçuk south by the Aydın / Denizli road. About 12 km after Selçuk, you will arrive at Çamlık. Once in Çamlık, turn right following Kuşadası signs, the museum entrance is 50 m away from the main road (the engines can been seen from the main road). The road is now very good and offers good sightings of the railway line. It does not take more than 15mm from Selçuk.

By dolmuş from Selçuk: cheap and easy as long as you know some basic Turkish. The minibus stops just outside the museum. NB Taxis are ten times more expensive than dolmuş.

By train from Izmir or Selçuk: take the local train to Ortaklar / Aydın, simply exit at Çamlık Station. Take the road to the left and walk about 1000m aiming towards the minaret. You cannot miss the museum entrance on the right side of the road. This is not the easiest nor the most comfortable nor the quickest way to go to the museum, but certainly the most scenic.

Opening hours and cost

The official hours are from 8am to 8pm, everyday. But the guard told us that it is possible to access the museum at night; indeed several back doors are used by the local pupils to access the village school, thus avoiding the children a walk along the main road. But I see no purpose visiting the museum past sunset as it has no lighting.

The guard will sell an entrance ticket for the equivalent of about 2 euro per person. The price may vary between 1 and 4 euros because of inflation and the exchange rate (August 2011 price is 5 TL per person).

Note that the museum is very well-suited for groups and is equipped to organise meals and parties on the premises.

Until 2000, the museum entrance ticket showed a drawing of TCDD engine 23001 (The original is in front of Haydarpaşa). 200 000 lira was the entrance price in that time of hyperinflated money. Some years later, the price reached several millions!

Visit

The museum has no souvenir shop and no guide. All engines carry an identification plate in English and Turkish with minimal technical data. This is the only explanation provided inside the museum. For this reason, we recommend visitors to download and use this guide:

A guide to Camlık outdoor Museum (800Ko)

Feel free also to take pictures. The engines are sufficiently spaced to allow the photographers to find some nice angles. However, lots of trees have been planted, sometime to near to the engines and hidding partially some equipments.

Collection

Çamlık museum offers a very good collection of the main TCDD steam motive power. The selection includes almost all of the steam engine types used by TCDD since World War II, but, unfortunatly, there are no diesel or electric engines. The engines are on static display in fair outside condition, but lacking some internal parts. A few of them use to be in working condition when they joined the museum. Now the weather is taking its toll and despite the efforts of the keepers, the engines are slowly rusting away.

A nice feature: children and grown ups can climb on all the engines and get a feeling from the cab or the running boards. Climbing is done using the engine ladders, so flex your muscles and beware not to fall!

The museum has also lots of railway items ranging from the engine shed, the turntable to cranes, fountain and tools and lamps (see list below). A room next to the shed displays a large collection of Mustafa Atatürk's photographs, some of them reminding us that Atatürk was a great railway traveler.

Loco 3355, Maffei 1911. August 2009. Photo JP Charrey.	Ataturk's car. August 2009. Photo JP Charrey.
Some of the engines are placed around a turntable. Photo JP Charrey	The museum utilizes much of the track work of the former station. Photo JP Charrey

Steam engines list

33 steam engines can currently be seen in Çamlık.

Passenger cars

The higlight of this section is a car from the former batch used in Ataturk's trains. It is in quite fair condition and can be visited inside.

• Ataturk's Saloon 4ufw n°12;
• Saloon car Linke Hoffman; 1939, without any markings
• Saloon 510, former CIWL car bearing number WL3459, Machinen Waggon Fabrik, Wien
• Car n°80877, Kalmar Werkstad AB n°193,
• Car n°3157; type A4ü, used in suburb trains; Simmerling Graz Pauker n°73753, Wien 1953.
• a metallic two axles car
• two metallic two axles cars
• a two axles wooden car with open platforms
• a two axles wooden car

Freight cars

• a 19m3, two axles tank wagon n°20 75 700 0 009-2
• a two axles van n°80 180
• a low sided, 13t, two axles wagon n°110 280
• a two axles van n°80 112
• a low sided flat car n°110 185 , 13t, two axles with Southern Railway (SR) axle boxes
• a flat car with diamond bogies, n°111 042
• a tank car n°163 912 with Bagdad Rly axle boxes

Other rolling stock on display

• Henschel steam rotary snowplow n°4, 1912
• Nohab Steam rotary snowplow n°138, 1929
• a three axles hand powered crane, 1890, former ORC, and its support wagon
• a two axles 6 tones hand powered crane, Ransomes and Rapier, London.
• a three axles steam crane, ORC 1899, Henry J Coles London
• a two bogies, 15t steam crane, Orton Crane & Shovels n°45045.
• a spare tender type K2'2'T32 Wanen from a BR52 Kriegslok
• tender of 23004 which is plinthed in front of Haydarpaşa. This tender was built by Sharp Stewart and still bears ORC axle boxes.
• a curious tank car made of a 2 axles ORC frame supporting two tanks obviously removed from a tank engine
• two hand lorries
• a narrow gauge wagon
• a small tamping machine

Miscellaneous items

• The Çamlık station buildings, including two interesting hand powered quay cranes. These are actually outside de the museum, opposite to the entrance.
• The engine shed. This shed is actually two buildings back to back, and not on the same level. The upper shed as one track, the other has two tracks. It has been rearranged to displays old tools, plates and lamps. The pits are covered with sleepers and the place is sometime used for laying dinner tables and hosting parties (on request).
• a collection of engine parts (air compressor, lamps, buffer stock, …) displayed next to the shed.
• a water tower
• a large turntable
• a station fountain
• a mechanical signal
• a conveyor belt coal loader

Pictures