Tourism is a funny thing. While the island of Bali in Indonesia is swamped by tourists, when we visited the old coal mining town of Sawahlunto on Sumatra, we were probably the only foreign tourists in town, despite the world heritage listing. That even applied in parts of Padang, the large coastal city nearby.

Sawahlunto owes its existence to the coal mining that took place around and even under the town. It was mainly constructed by the Dutch in the 19th century and their stamp still lies on the town, with many Dutch colonial era buildings and a church visible on a stroll around the centre of town, alongside industrial remains. We stayed a night at the historic KHA Ombilin Hotel, part of the listing.

There are multiple museums dotted around town, that supplemented our self-guided walk around the town. Each costs 50,000 IDR for foreigners and the staff will insist on guiding you through them. Our favourite was the Museum Lubang Tambang Mbah Soero, which includes a tour of an old mining tunnel. The Museum Goedang Ransoem was a former public kitchen - quite unexpected and intriguing. The Museum Kerati at the train station wasn't as interesting, except for the old steam engine.

We enjoyed our visit to the town more than expected, partially because it's just a relaxed place and easy to walk around. Come night fall, there's also plenty of food stalls around Lapangan Segitiga park and near Terminal Sawahlunto, the bus terminal. It's hard to imagine when it was a dusty coal mining town, although the locals are proud to share their history.

The site includes a number of other components related to the railway that connected the town to the port in Padang, which we mainly skipped, including the warehouses in Padang. However, we took a ride on the listed railway from Padang Airport into the city centre - a comfortable and cheap option, although sadly infrequent.

To get to Sawahlunto from Padang, we took a local bus both direction. The more frequent buses are run by Pool Jasa Malindo dan Trans Mitra, every 30 minutes according to the sign at Terminal Sawahlunto, where we caught our return bus. Going to Sawahlunto we took the more infrequent buses operated by Fifafel Perdana Trans (also on Jl. Dr. Sutomo in Padang), which are more modern with A/C and faster - perhaps a little too fast! The highway from Padang to Sawahlunto ascends to about 1100m above sea level at the pass over the mountains behind the city - a slow trip amongst the trucks!