| Since June was quiet for events, when I found out about classic cars attending the Tanfield Railway Gala, I was keen to go. It had been nine years since we last had a Jeep at Tanfield for their War Weekend, and this was a great chance to take both Jeeps out, and enjoy some steam engine action at the same time. It was only a 20 minute drive to East Tanfield Station where we were displaying. There were only about a dozen cars on Saturday, many of which didn't appear old enough to be called classic in my opinion, but on Sunday there was a good turnout, with many more older vehicles. | |||
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| There were six locos running during the weekend, five steam and one diesel. Two of the steam locos were visiting Tanfield, one; "A. No.5" was from Newcastle and the other; "Mech Navvies Ltd", came all the way from Wales! This outing was also the first time out for "Hope" since the name was painted on the side. | |||
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| I shot about 36 videos through my DSLR, both from the trains and on the platforms. A few were cut out due to extra loud public voices, but the rest have been compiled into a single video showing scenes from around the railway taken over both days. | |||
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The five steam locos were pulling vintage passenger
coaches and one coal train. A few goods wagons were mixed in to some trains.
At the back of the Marley Hill yard, where the shunting demonstration was
going on, are the storage sidings. There are a number of unrestored locos,
coaches and wagons laid up here.
The weather on Saturday was cool and damp, with a number of light showers. Sunday was much better, and while there were a couple of heavy showers, the Sun did come out and it got out quite warm out of the wind. These differing conditions created a wide range of lighting conditions for photographs. |
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| As exhibitors, we were given some free travel passes which allowed us unlimited rides on the trains. While we didn't spend all day riding the rails, we did have a number of rides, stopping at some of the stations for a look around, or to just watch the trains come and go. There were a few classic trucks in attendance which stayed for most of the day, while the cars seemed to arrive late and leave early. Only a few each day remained for the full day. The Marley Hill yard, seen below, was used on and off throughout the weekend for shunting demonstrations The multiple tracks allowed shunting without stopping the passenger operations. | |||
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| Only two of the locos were named, "Sir Cecil A. Cochrane" and Lyta's favourite; "Twizell". We caught a late afternoon train back to the main platform of East Tanfield station, pulled by the Mech Navvies saddle tank loco, as "Twizell" stood at the bay platform, waiting to take the previous passenger train back up the line. We packed up the Jeeps and headed home, clocking up about 100 miles between the two Jeeps. | |||