Tyseley open day.

Sunday was a great day as it was fine and Tyseley open day. Yippee lots of steam trains. 

After a long bus journey to get there our first adventure was a short trip on a steam hauled train. With this loco. 

After this we were delighted to see Bittern, the star of the day. 

 

We had to be shooed out of the way so it could come past us. I thoroughly enjoyed being 18 inches from a moving steam train. 

Bittern was followed by Earl Mount Edgcumbe. 

They then coupled together and ran as a pair. 

Gracie wanted to see the engineering shed, so we wandered around it and then found ourselves in the viewing area as the afore mentioned locos did a few runs past. 

There were loads of people watching as the locos disappeared into the cloud of steam they produced. 

Then we made our own spot the difference photos. 

Can you see the changes I made in the next two photographs?

To round off our trip spectacularly they decided to turn Bittern on the turntable 

The following pictures tried to capture this whilst avoiding a buffer in the tummy!

A fantastic event :-). 

Blackburn and back.

Today it was a trip up the west coast line to Blackburn to pick up KM and Gracie. 

The 9:15 from New Street was where I started. 

Unfortunately, or typically, I was late into Preston  and missed my connection. 

It was then plan B and a train to Blackburn 

Before another train back to Mill Hill. 

Not too much delay thankfully. 

Children were safely collected and then it was time for the journey back. 

But no train. 

And little information. 

Anyway, it was late but eventually arrived. 

Perhaps it's colder up north than I remember. 

We got the Pendolino back and arrived safely. 

Lots of travelling but much better than driving. 

Tramming at Crich

I was duty one again today. A poor weather forecast and not wanting to shunt trams around, helped me choose Glasgow 812 to drive today. 

A nice air brake tram. 

In fact all today's trams were air brake, Blackpool 630

And Leeds 180

The access tram was also out. 

The weather steadily improved throughout the day and we had over 300 visitors, far better than I had expected. 

Today's Duty Onspector was my good friend Roger, seen in action dealing with matters of the day in front of the newly repainted tardis. 

In the afternoon Blackpool 762 was out on driver training. 

Another great day, I drove 12 round trips. 

All too soon it was time for cleaning trams and going home, but one last photo opportunity to show off 630s new platform doors. 

Only one more driving day before the end of the season. It always goes so quickly. 

The non-choir tour outing

Today our very good friends Felicity, Sue and Ray came to visit. 

We wanted to thank them for all their efforts at our wedding and as we've been on Sue and Ray's boat twice, this seemed perfect. 

It was a nice, partly sunny, and certainly warm day. 

Everyone duly arrived at 10:00. 

And we set off. 

We sailed to Tibberton and found a lovely mooring just by the railway and the old church. We had trouble at the winding hole as someone had moored right across from it but they moved on when we asked them to. 

Alison had made beef bourguignon for lunch which was delicious and then her special Cassata cheese for dessert. 

All to soon it was time for the return journey. Sue helped at the locks which was greatly appreciated. 

Hanbury locks are quite deep and very dark. I still think they are a brilliant invention, so simple and effective. 

We had at thoroughly enjoyable day and are already looking forward to the next one. 

My other hobby.

Yesterday I was booked as Driver 1 which meant first choice of tram to drive.

Heidi, my conductor for the day, quite fancied having Rack 2. She hadn't driven it before and when she mentioned she would like to do a trip as it was being withdrawn from service at the end of the year we quickly chose it. Rack 2 is probably my favourite tram and I didn't realise it was being withdrawn, so the chance to have a day driving it was brilliant. 

I drove 9 trips and Heidi did 3. The fine weather trips were great but we did slip slide away on the wet ones. 

We also had trainee conductor Luke with us, pictured here helping Heidi with the information talk at Glory Mine. 

The other trams in service were 273,

and 510. 

Blackpool 40 was doing an Ultimate Driving Experience and luckily for them, when waiting at the staff post became too frustrating they could just turn and go. 

After all the long waits for other vehicles and crews, we ended up last tram as usual, but I'm not complaining, we got one more trip than anybody else :-).