Tag: Train

View from Cheddleton

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Watercolour I did several years ago at the end of Cheddleton Station platform looking towards (eventually) Froghall wharf.

In the other direction the train line extends half a mile or so before ending abruptly neat the Cheddleton to Leek main road. The train line itself used to continue to Leek before travelling on to Stoke-on-Trent.

The line is starting to be rebuilt towards Leek! It’s exciting news that has been long awaited.

To find out more look up the Churnet Valley railway on the Internet.

Manchester

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What cities do you want to visit?

I haven’t been to Manchester for years. I like it because it is a cultural centre. Galleries and Theatres and museums. But traffic is difficult. All the routes I used to know have changed. There are more bus lanes and priorities have changed. I got stuck in the city centre about five years ago. We had to turn round in a one way street and follow a bus lane to get out! Luckily I wasn’t fined.

Other problems include the train service, our last train from Manchester is always too early. You can’t stay for a drink after a theatre visit, there is no way to travel unless you take the car, and with carbon taxes it’s not possible to drive into the city centre in a pre millennium car.

Guards van and different gauge track.

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After we were robbed a few days ago, some bits of trains and tracks turned up in the alleyway under the vegetation.

But so much has gone. Thirty years or more of memories. Trains, trucks, carriages, different sizes and shapes.

But most precious was a hand built bike my hubby bought in the 1970’s. The frame came first, 531 double butted steel. Then he had the wheels, chainset, pedals, handlebars added to it. That bike went to the south west, the lake district, all over Lancashire, and toured England. That has my hubbys heart infused into it.

There is a book called The Third Policeman, by Myles Magopaline? A pseudonym of Flann O’brien. It’s about how when someone owns a bike for a long time their molecules swap between person and bike so they take on characteristics of each other.

It is deeply saddening to lose your memories and belongings. He has lost his precious bicycle.

Train

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Trains

Thursdays #bandofsketchers prompt was train. Train design, didn’t look at an image, just channelling a screen print idea. The Green light is on the front of an American style train with a snow plow sort of thing. Obviously based on steam trains. Maybe in a transport museum? Artrage app drawing.

It’s all click bait!

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Scour the news for an entirely uninteresting story. Consider how it connects to your life. Write about that.

What uninteresting story can I write about? I still like reading newspapers so that means I can find something uninteresting if I look hard enough. But then my sense if humour kicks in amd I will see the silly side of the story.

Most online stuff seems to be click bait. Stuff that you click on and the article has nothing to do with the headline and you are dragged off to some advert about bitcoin.

So finding something was hard, but a clue to something came from my hubby. I asked him if he had seen anything interesting. He then proceeded to tell me about an article in his monthly magazine from Apedale light railway. He told me about a well tank. (a steam engine with a tank of water between the frame of it instead of outside like a saddle tank).

He said the engine was called Stanhope and it was found sunk in a swamp in Africa where it had slid off its rails. It was rescued and restored and brought back to the UK.

So the story is entirely uninteresting to me. I like steam trains, but the story does not enthrall me. But it interests hubby, so I guess the point is the old saying, one man’s meat is another man’s poison.

Staying put!

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What are your future travel plans?

Not flying! I’m scared to fly and it increases your carbon footprint.

Not driving! I’m careful because of health issues. I can still safely drive but I’m being very cautious and not going far…

Not cycling! I’m too old and unfit to cycle any more.. I wish I could…

Not riding on the train! They are too expensive, and the railways seem to have been reducing services recently. If I want to travel on one it would take a lot of planning and probably a lot of money. Plus you are not going to be able to buy tickets at a ticket office, they are being cut back.

Not going by boat! We are near to a local canal, but hiring a boat for a few days can be expensive too, and I think having to go through lock gates could be very difficult. Plus I think steering a 72 foot canal barge must be difficult.

Not by bus! The services are being cut so you can’t get back in the evening. One friend had to walk 9 miles to get home last week because he missed the last bus…. Before 7pm!

I will be walking… Not going very far as in not very fit. But I guess I’m OK with that. I don’t commute and shops are close. Holidays are too expensive so my travel plans this summer? A staycation !

Found card

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I found this in a pile of old letters a few days ago. We knew exactly who to send it to, a very old friend who comes from the south west. It’s about the Bodmin, Wadebridge and Padstow railway.

The railway line was very curved, the corners were tight, so very few engines could travel along it. It was closed to passengers in the 1930s. It was one of the earliest railways and only very short wheelbased engines could used it. It was mainly used for transportation of China clay across Bodmin moor in Cornwall to Plymouth. The track bed was laid with a camber so the engines could get round the curves. The engines were 240 Beattie Well tanks. They were usde to lower the centre of gravity (Information courtesy of my hubby).

Many times

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Have you ever been camping?

When I was younger we used to go camping a lot. I can recall many adventures over a few years. On one occasion we decided to go cyclo camping. We took a train to Wales and cycled over to a campsite. But when we got there I realised we didn’t have the tent just the fly sheet and poles! We had a chat with someone who was already there and he kindly let us attach our flysheet to the back of his tent. We spent a cold night under it and in the morning decided we couldn’t continue. We did not have enough money to buy a new tent and carry on so we caught the train home!

Another time we drove down to St Ives. The campsite was on a field above the town and we spent a few nights there. On the last night there was a howling gale. My hubby stretched out and put his foot through the zip at the front of the tent! We knew we would get soaked if rain got in, so I got out my sewing kit, I had a torch in my mouth (hubby had gone to sleep) so I sewed up the front of the tent to hold it shut. I think that was our last night there.

We got a new tent and went to Grizedale forest in the lake district. It was a sculpture park and I remember walking around the forest trying to find all the sculptures, these included ones by Anthony Gormley I think. We also cycled up to Hawkshead and from and to Windermere where we travelled on the train.

The last trip I remember was in the car. We went to Anglesey and camped at Red Wharf bay. We had borrowed a big six berth frame tent, which we had never used before. It was only after an hour of trying to put it up that I noticed the built in curtains in it were on the OUTSIDE! We had to start again. The other slight disaster was my hubby backing the car up next to the tent. He drove over the saucepan we had taken with us.

I think that’s enough for one night. Safe camping!

Forty years ago

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Distant memory

A memory of something that happened to me when I was at college just popped into my head. We wereon a London trip to look at Art galleries and museums. For some reason wewere given cloakroom tickets (raffle tickets) instead of actual train tickets on the way down. We spent several hours visiting the National Gallery, the Courtauld Institute, the Tate and the Whitechapel Gallery. But then I miscalculated the distance from another gallery to Euston Station via the Underground (the map is very beautifully designed but the distances are altered to make all the stations fit. And so me and my friend arrived on the platform at Euston as the train yo Stoke-on-Trent started to pull out. I ran but couldn’t jump up to the train door. We had to go to the station ticket office with our raffle tickets! After explaining they agreed we could catch the next train, two hours later we were off. But unfortunately it only went to Stafford, I don’t know how we got back from there but we did… Bus I think, yes, I couldn’t afford to get a taxi the twenty miles we were short on a student grant…

Minature train

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Good to see a woman driver on the minature train at Trentham Gardens. We went there today because our neighbours are having some work done and had mini diggers rumbling all morning so I couldn’t open my windows because of the noise.

We decided to walk round the lake which was lovely because there was a cool breeze, but then we caught the minature train down half the length of the lake to make life easier. I still had a twinge in my back so had to get my hubby to help me get back off the train!

We walked round the rest of the lake and I took some photos of flowers around the lake which are still looking lovely. I might try and look at doing some small paintings of them.