<< | Railway Museums | Ankara Museum >>

Çamlık Outdoor Museum

Foreword

The Çamlık outdoor museum, which was inaugurated in 1991, has one of the largest steam engines collection in Europe. 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.

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.

Address

Access

By car from Izmir: take the road south to Selçuk. Exit Selçuk south by the Aydın / Denizli road. About 12 km after Selçuk, you will arrive at Çamlık. Once in Çamlık, turn right, the museum entrance is 50 m away from the main road (the engines can been seen from the main road) 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 euro because of inflation and exchange rate (August 2007 price is 3 TL).

Until 2000, the museum entrance ticket showed a drawing of TCDD engine 23001 (The original is in front of Haydarpaşa)

Collection

Çamlık museum offers a very good collection of the main TCDD steam motive powers. The selection includes almost all the steam engine types used by TCDD since World War II (unfortunatly, there are no diesel or electric engines). The engines are in static display in fair outside condition, buck 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. All the engines carry an identification plate in English. 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!

Feel free also to take pictures. The engines are sufficiently spaced to allow the photographers to find some nice angles. Also, until now, the museum had no souvenir shop. It only sells a very small leaflet showing colored pictures of some of the engines and some postcards.

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 Atatürk's photograph, some of them reminding us that Atatürk's was a great railway traveler.

Being outdoors allows a large space between the engines. Photo JP Charrey	A view of the only signal preserved in Çamlık. 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

31 steam engines can currently be seen in Çamlık.

Other rolling stock on display

Passenger cars previously stored in Alsancak have been transfered to Çamlık recently. These are not yet listed here under.

• Henschel steam rotary snowplow n°4, 1912
• Steam rotary snowplow n°138
• a two axles car
• 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 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
• two hand lorries
• a narrow gauge wagon
• a small tamping machine
• a spare tender (type K2'2'T32 Wanen from a BR52 Kriegslok)

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

More pictures of Camlık Museum here

56337, Çamlık Museum, August 1996. Photo JP Charrey	An interesting hand lorry. Photo JP Charrey
A nice British built 6 tons crane, June 1998. Photo JP Charrey