November - Intercity Railway Society

unidentified Cl.121 bubble car
at Staines West on the 12.05 to West Drayton
and Yiewsley service, 21 st December 1964
On Boxing day my world's worst football team, my youth club, had their best result of the season so
far... they only lost 0-2, true a friendly against the cricket team but a result non the less! Finally on the
29 th my last ever rest day from work was spent chasing steam on the Southern starting behind D1682
to Banbury, followed by 7900 onto Oxford and D1690 to Reading. I followed a similar but shorter route
to my November visit, owing to the lack of daylight hours and my haulage was 76059 to Crowthorne,
80153 to Wokingham, 80032 to Ash, an EMU to Guildford and back to Reading Southern with 31858.
So ended another great year. Roll on 1965.
photos by David Spencer (to be cont)
Preservation Galas
East Lancs Railway Steam Gala, 20 th -21 st Oct 2012 by Andrew Woodcock:
Looking on the internet the line up of locos did not give me the “get up and go” factor. The line up was
3 North British built locos 3F Jinty 0-6-0T 47324, B1 4-6-0 61306 and N2 0-6-0T 1744 (69523) plus
LNWR 0-8-0 49395 on loan from the NRM and 0-6-0ST 132 'Sapper'. What settled the decision to go
was the advertised attraction of a Lancashire and Yorkshire Bus Day at Bury Transport Museum.
I therefore chose the Sunday to go and drove the 30mins from home to Heywood which has a large
free car park and much better sign-posted than I remember on a previous visit. I did not require a day
rover but just a return to Bury. The first train was headed by the 1744 and my later return trip again by
1744 with 132 on the rear which gave a very spirited performance. I was much more impressed with
the Gala than I expected and it was a lovely sunny day and a large number of passengers. D3871 was
in the carriage sidings as we approached Bury. Outside the Diesel Depot were the Hymek D7076
obscured by D1501 and a black unnumbered Barclay class 01 shunter D2956.
The Transport Museum was a big letdown. Outside, including the free shuttles there were less than 10
buses with just two from Yorkshire. Inside was nothing special, just steam loco BCGD No 1 and a
handful of enthusiasts stands.
Contrary to my expectations the Steam Gala proved the more interesting and enjoyable.
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