I have lived in Hazelbrook, on and off, since the winter of 1991, when I bought the little cottage which I returned to 4 years ago. Readers of this blog, should there be any, will have observed that I have lived other places too during that time, most notably, Japan.

The town is less sleepy now, with a four-lane highway running through it and an upgraded railway station. There are more shops and several expresso machines( none in 1991!), a revamped Memory Park and fewer vacant blocks of land. A large, somewhat controversial, bridge spans the new highway. It has become a little more middle class as more refugees from the Sydney real estate market flee further west; also perhaps, a little wealthier. But it is still fundamentally Hazelbrook.

Trains have run through Hazelbrook for well over a century and have been stopping to unload mountains-bound passages since before Federation, the station opening in 1884. The line was not electrified until the 1950's which meant that for a good 70 years, those trains were steam locomotives. It must have been exciting for tourists and locals alike to be ploughing up the mountain, constantly gaining height and passing what were then rather English villages and towns. The sound and smell of it, the plunge and pulse of the locomotion, must have exhilarated the spirit.

Steam engines at speed c. 1930's



Hazelbrook Station c.1915