My last holiday of the year is back to North East England, firstly just outside Bishop Auckland then on to my birthplace of Seaburn. Due to family commitments I’d planned to visit late September but as the bank holiday is as late as it can be I decided to come up earlier which is allowing me to tick off some bucket list items (more on these over the next few days).
On the way up I revisited the Wensleydale Railway, catching the first train meant an early start from home but I was awake anyway. It’s several years since I last rode the line, my last visit was to a model railway show while I was camping nearby and it was too busy to bother with a journey. Unfortunately they’ve now abandoned steam altogether due to finances which is a shame, I had hoped we’d at least get the Heritage DMU (a designation that encompasses the 1st generation diesel mechanical railcars) but instead it was the Pacer. ☹️ These units were built as a stopgap using bus body and interior parts on a railway chassis, as they were all withdrawn a few years ago I guess they are “heritage” in their own way but they are one of the worst vehicles ever to grace Britain’s railways and are definitely not ideal for back pain sufferers. This one came from the West Wales network - I know ‘cause they haven’t changed the prerecorded announcements. 😀
The Wensleydale Railway has long been one of my favourites, partly because they’re always so friendly. Having arrived a bit early I was given a personal tour of the Station Master’s House, which is attached to the business part of Leeming Bar station, nothing much I haven’t seen before but interesting that it was definitely high status, it even had an attached washroom complete with copper (but still an outside toilet!) Whilst sitting at Leyburn one of the railway staff wandered through offering his services to take pictures of people sitting on the train - no interest to me but a few people handed him their phones.
More trains followed as I stopped off at Locomotion in Shildon on my way to the hotel. Again I’ve been before but the Flying Scotsman was on show and they were doing rides behind the replica Rocket, although I didn’t bother with either it presented photo opportunities. After a coffee and ginger cake, ostensibly made to Mrs Stevenson’s own recipe, it was time to head to the hotel and check in. The rooms are around a courtyard, shades of the recent trip to Warners, but are well appointed.
I didn’t take a lot of photos as they’re places I’ve been before but here’s a few:
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| The Flying Scotsman |
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| The Pacer, the most uncomfortable train to run in Britain… |
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| …since these went out of fashion in the 1800s! |
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