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Allan and Richard are off to the Bournemouth bus rally. And emulating Ron…..

Had a bad journey down. Richard told me there was trouble on the Mobile Car Park past junction 6. So headed to Tolworth Towers to pick up the A3…..

This was the first bad decision. Slip road was shut south bound. Cut through Tolworth and again slip road was shut. Finally after an hour and a half we went over the M25 at Leatherhead. We then head towards Guildford to pick up A3 then Hogs Back to get to Winchester to pick up our intended route to Bournemouth….

Day two started well got to National Motor Museum. Then drove over to have a ride on a train to Swanage….

Day three. Enjoying a nice Sunny day in Kings Park in Bournemouth.

And some final bits and pieces. When railway cast iron signs were an art form!

A fortune in nameplates? I assume that they are all real??

Note the Lynton and Barnstable Railway nameplates, Lew, Yeo and Lyn.

Mechanical horse, LMS and BR style.

This one needed a real horse. A different world?

That’s it for now, folks!

And into the modern era….

A couple of fast movers….

Under the channel….

The coaches and wagons are as interesting as the locomotives. Old….

Postal….

And more recent…..

Final post next time will be vehicles and nameplates.

Starting today with a mock up of a station in the days of steam, with some interesting platform furniture.

A little narrow gauge diversion….

Getting more up to date with a Southern Schools class…

The lovely streamlined Duchess of Hamilton. A rival for Mallard in elegance?

Not all locos were this spectacular – most work was done by locos like the LMS Crab.

Evening Star, the last BR standard steam locomotive to be built.

A waste of a good Bulleid Pacific?

Still more to come!

A few from the golden age of steam – the decades either side of 1900. So many elegant locomotive designs. The Brighton line and the LSWR….

The SECR…

Midland elegance….

The Great Northern.

And the North Eastern.

Next time, we’ll come a little more up to date.

Starting with the very old…..

The slightly less old….

And two ducks of inderterminate age…..

More locos next time.

No. 1 son Michael has been on holiday and started in York, of course including the railway museum. A key exhibit is Mallard – officially the fastest steam locomotive, but there are rumours that a Bulleid rebuilt Merchant Navy class beat the figure of 126mph.

And York is well worth a visit, too….

Ir’s a bit of a shambles, really…..

I assume that Michael was taking a photo of the Routemaster….. The flood levels are of professional interest. I’m sure that there were plenty of floods before 1892. The levels are less due to global warming, more due to flood banks upstream protecting development and cutting out the floodplain.

It is, of course, important to try the local Viking delicacies!

Next time, we enter the museum!

Back to the Bluebell for a the little trains. But first a brief report on the ESNG meeting on July 1. I missed part of the meeting to visit the dentist, and also watched the England game on my laptop. We had a very respectable eight members present, but they tended to come and go (like me.) No pictures, except one of still life, and one of Neil taking Farish multiple units apart!

Meanwhile, back at the Bluebell, photos of some of the layouts. Good to see Surrey Arms (EM) on show. A very compact bit of a London terminus.

Switching on K Street Yard.

The (extended) Elbow Lane. It’s still a small layout….

The beautiful Penworth – Pendon in N?

Ouse Wharf.

The original Ffarquhar Branch was on display.

Benbridge (N).

Upper Corris…

Ouse Wharf…

And Brook Street…..

Allan and a brace of Derek’s went to the annual Bluebell railway modelling weekend. Today, we have a few pictures of the big trains…..

The original Ffarquhar Branch was on display. So was Stepney…

And the model trams.

Other model railways follow soon….