town in New South Wales, Australia
Tarana is a small town of 187 (2021) between Lithgow in the upper Blue Mountains and Bathurst. It sits at the junction of the Main Western Line and the now disused Oberon Branch Line, with the latter being almost the only thing to see in town.
🌍 Tarana railway station is the main port of entry into town. Tarana is at the very edge of NSW Trainlink's Intercity network on the Blue Mountains Line and can be visited without prebooking a ticket – however, as the town is west of Lithgow, it is only served by the diesel Bathurst Bullet trains which are very infrequent. The town has 2 morning services from Bathurst headed towards Sydney (Central), 2 evening services from Bathurst towards Lithgow, and 4 towards Bathurst (from both Sydney and Lithgow). These trains are on the Opal network and are thus inexpensive to use with a return trip costing no more than $16 a day.
Another alternative is to use the Dubbo XPT between Sydney (Central) and Dubbo, which is a booked service. However, it is a request stop; you will need to notify the guard and NSW Trainlink that you intend to get off at Tarana.
If you are visiting by road, Diamond Swamp Road connects Tarana to the Great Western Highway, though using Sodwalls Rd and Magpie Hollow Road may be faster from Lithgow. The three aforementioned roads are sealed but are narrow with no shoulder.
The town is small enough that it is almost entirely navigable on foot.
The primary sight of interest in Tarana are the abandoned tracks of the Oberon Line, which closed in 1979. As of March 2024, most of the tracks are well overgrown, but the Oberon Tarana Heritage Railway Inc has been slowly working towards restoring the railway line as a heritage railway. Today, the best place to see the abandoned tracks are on Mutton Falls Rd (where the tracks used to run is clearly marked) and near 2913 Tarana Rd, the latter of which is much closer to town and is much more intact than further south.
| Bathurst ← | W BMT E | → Rydal → Sydney |
| Dubbo ← Bathurst ← | W Western Region (Dubbo XPT) E | → Rydal (request only) → Lithgow → Sydney |