Christmas is coming, but 11 hardy souls decided that running trains was the perfect escape from the season….

Mind you, Rails of Sheffield’s Advent Calendar has come up with a few good bargains – my unrebuilt Merchant Navy had a running in turn.  The BR blue express livery only lasted from 1949-1953 or so, when blue gave way to green as BR found (rediscovering the wheel), that blue locomotives faded quickly.  But it’s a beautiful livery, and suited most of the large locos that received it.

Derek was testing a Farish 4-CEP – surely one of the least appreciated models around.  It beautifully captures the prototype – that was very much part of my upbringing.  I only travelled on them a few times, the 4-EPB being my usual method of transport, but they were always passing on the main line down to Orpington.

Allan’s East German locomotive and tankers seems to have Brexited through the Channel Tunnel – it was last seen running at Stuttgart.

And we had the usual Japanese and American contribution from Paul, Simon and Graham.  Also good to have Peter Swan visiting to see what we were up to.

We will be meeting on December 20th.  By that time we will definitely need to run a few trains!

Another modelling challenge – can you do this with your locos (actually it looks a bit like our track on club night….)

And a little bit of history from YouTube…..