Bure Valley Railway

This summer we visited the Bure Valley Railway, a 15" gauge miniature railway, built on trackbed of the old standard gauge branch line from Wroxham to Aylsham. After told my two year old daughter we were going on a steam train, she announced that she they were noisy and she didn't like going in the dark. We eventually realised that she must be remembering a visit to Moors Valley the previous summer, where she was upset by other children screaming as the train went through a tunnel. Fortunately she thought the tunnel was brilliant this time and we all had an enjoyable ride.  The scenery isn't spectacular, and the intermediate stops are halts rather than stations, and it's a short walk at the Wroxham end of the line to the river. There is a path running most of the length of the line, and some connecting footpaths so it would have been possible to walk some of the return journey and have additional photo opportunities, however the weather was looking ominous and the children were a bit tired, so we got the train back.

Of course Colin Lea has visited it (I'm beginning to think he's visited every narrow gauge line in the country) and gave it 65% on his marking system.

Here's a couple more photos, there's plenty more in my Bure Valley Railway Set on Flickr.





Links:
Bure Valley Railway
Bure Valley Railway Set on Flickr

The Lymington Branch

22nd May 2010 was the last day of operation for slam door EMUs operated on the Lymington Branch. The two 3CIGs, 1497 (Freshwater) and 1498 (Farringford) have now been replaced by a 158 and Desiro. We went down the weekend before for our last chance to ride on these trains. 1497 Freshwater in Blue/Grey was operating the line that day. We caught the train down to Lymington Pier, and got off to take some photos and look around. There isn't much at Lymington Peir, so we caught the next train back to Lymington Town, then walked down to the quayside to have our lunch. As we were finishing lunch we fishing boat came in and started unloading its catch of cuttlefish. After a stop at the playground we headed back to the station when I took a few more photos and then headed home. On the way back I took a few photos at Brokenhurst, including a couple of the unusual swing bridge which would have originally been for parcel trolleys, and has been kept to provide disabled access.

Isle of Wight Railways

Last summer we spent a week on the Isle of Wight and visited the Isle of Wight Steam Railway. We got a day rover which also allowed us to take a trip on the Island Line too. This was well worth doing as travelling on an old tube train through sunny green countryside was a memorable experience. We caught the Island Line from Smallbrook Junction to Brading, then back to Ryde Pier Head. After having a snack and watching the hovercraft coming in from Portsmouth we headed back to Smallbrook Junction for what was suppose to be a 10 minute wait for the steam train. Unfortunately the locomotive had problems and we had a 45 minute wait. This gave me the opportunity to take some more photos of the Island Line trains, and to chat to one of the volunteers who told us that they would like to extend the line to Ryde St John's Road by running over the Island Line's tracks. Apparently South West Trains are sympathetic to this plan as it would simplify their timetables by eliminating the need to stop at Smallbrook Junction, but I don't think there are any official plans in place yet. Once we were back at Havenstreet we had our lunch and looked round the station and museum, and workshops where there was a carriage being painted and a stripped down O2 class. I liked this retro-style poster for the L&B railway.

Here's a couple more photos, the rest are on Flickr in sets for the Isle of Wight Steam Railway and the Island Line.

Flickr Galleries and The Avontuur Railway

Recently Flickr introduced galleries which they describe as "a way to curate up to 18 public photos or videos of your fellow members into one place". There is a limit of 18 photos, and you can't include any of your own photos, but they allow you to write a reason why you chose each photo and an overall description. Flickr has some good photos for modelling inspiration and I think galleries could be a good tool for collecting them for projects. I've also recently be looking at pictures of the South African narrow gauge lines so I decided to put some rather nice photos of the Avontuur Railway into a gallery. The Avontuur Railway was 177 miles long and ran from Port Elizabeth to Avontuur. The tourist Apple Express runs from Port Elizabeth but many of the stations, including the terminus at Avontuur are now closed. To see what Avontuur looks like now take a look at these recent photos posted on RMWeb.

I've also been watching more YouTube videos recently. Here are two that I found and watched with my daughter tonight.

A Class 91 crosses Van Staden's Bridge:


An NG15 leaving Port Elizabeth:

Eastleigh Lakeside Railway

We went to Eastleigh Lakeside Country Park on Saturday and took a trip on the train to celebrate my daughter's first birthday. Here she is pointing at a fine little Garratt. The railway runs from one side of the park to the other and has a return loop at both ends. This picture was taken at Monks Brook Halt (though you can't get to the brook from here). There is a small playground here and we also walked round one of the lakes. The round trip is about a mile long - we took the return trip on behind a Royal Scot which they seemed to be having some problems with. In fact they replaced it with a diesel for the last train of the day when we got back to the main station. It was an enjoyable afternoon out on the railway and it was good to have an excuse to ride on it.

The Welsh Highland Railway on Flickr

I was browsing the Ffestiniog and Welsh Highland Railways photo pool on Flickr and found some great photos taken by Flickr user mattbuck4950. They are all licensed under Attribution-Share Alike Attribution-Share Alike which means I can reproduce them here. Here are some of my favorites of Castell Caernarfon at Caernarfon station. I particularly like the angles these photos were taken from. The first few are taken at the sort of elevation which model railways are often viewed from and the final picture higlights the bulk of the Funkey against the wall.









The last photo has got me imagining an O14 micro shelf layout, not much more than a senic display stand, with a model of Castell Caernarfon or one of the Garratts sitting on it. I can only dream of being able to afford a O14 Garratt or having the skill, time and patience to scratch build an O14 Funkey that I would be happy with! I'll keep focused on 4mm scale for now.

Rheilffordd Talyllyn

It's about time I posted some photos of the Talyllyn Railway. It scored 71% on Colin Lea's heritage railway scoring system. We travelled on the scenic Cambrian Coast line from Pwllheli to Twywn which was a bargain at £6. Travelling there by train also meant that we got a 20% discount on the Talyllyn!

The Talyllyn railway seemed familiar despite having never been there before. This was partly due the the Talyllyn being a popular prototype to model (for example Quarry Sidings and Rheilffordd Cilcewydd on NGRM Online) and partly due to reading Rev. W. Awdry's books, in particular The Little Old Engine which has an illustration of Dolgoch Viaduct which stuck in my head.

For more information on the Talyllyn take a look at their website or it's article on Wikipedia which is a featured article.

Here's the thumbnails of my photos:

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