Category: Photography

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Jogging through January

Well here we are approaching mid January, a traditionally quiet running month for the railway. Though as per usual there’s a lot going on through the month behind the scenes.

A diesel gala lies ahead of us in March with a class 66 amongst the running locomotives. This is something to look forward to. Diesel enthusiasts are generally keen an knowledgeable group.

The other day I received an email, now that fact in itself is not unusual, but this one was from a past regular visitor to Orton Mere on gala days. It’s always nice to receive communication from old visitors, many of their comments remind me of how long it’s been since I ran Orton Mere. Time progresses at a steady pace and I was in my 50’s when I joined the railway and last November I marked my 70th birthday.

He commented on how time has flown by and referred to some past events, I must dig out some of my pictures of the past at the railway, and put a few on here., we shall have to see.

Somebody once said that you don’t have a future if you don’t remember the past. So with that in mind let’s look forward to services in 2026, looking forward to not only special event days but also normal running days. Have a great time when you next visit the railway and tink positive about the coming year.

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Rail200

This weekend is our rail200 weekend, a great weekend ahead with visiting steam locomotives and many services.

If you are visiting us this weekend I hope you have a great time. You can pay on the day if you wish. Have a look on our web site for all the information you will need.

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A super day

Wednesday 3rd April was Autism day and we had a special, day with just Thomas running and events at Wansford geared towards the day.

Had a number of people who had visited come up on the webcam chat saying how much they had enjoyed it.

Well done to all those involved I am sure there are many good memories for visitors to recall and enjoy again.

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Here we go again.

A couple of days ago hot on the heels of Flying Scotsman saw Britannia arrive for a weeks visit where it will be busy with a photo charter, driver experience, passenger services and a dining train on Saturday evening.

Wednesday kicked off with a freight photo charter, mixed weather but not a bad day for photography.

Here are a couple of freight charter pictures from Thomas Woolley, and my thanks to him for sending them.

You can see what I mean by not a bad day for photography..

I am sure the passenger services will be full over the weekend,

Another great visit, and I can’t help but wonder what ,else will visit through the year.

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That was a brilliant visit.

There are visiting locomotives that bring in visitors and then there is Flying Scotsman.

It was sure to be a memorable visit and it exceeded expectations, I mean even the weather was on our side for a change.

Record visitors and more importantly happy visitors.

Looking at it from behind the web cams where I supplied up to date information, times and answered questions. We had times when over 100 visitors were watching the Wansford cam on YouTube, with large numbers visiting the Orton Mere cam to see the services run through the station, supported excellently by the Pacer running a shuttle service.

We had a number of coaches visit, and afterwards several of the passengers used technology on the move to connect to the web cam and join in the chat, all commenting on how much they had enjoyed themselves.

It must rate as one the most if not the most successful visit.

Now we come to Britannia…….

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The First Weekend

Well that’s the first weekend of the visit by Flying Scotsman out of the way.

Sitting at home looking after two web cams and answering questions and posting train details I must say I enjoyed it.

Yes, I would loved to have opened Orton Mere, but I realise that’s not going to happen again. But I got the pleasure of exchanging information about the event with not only locals and UK visitors but with people as faraway as Argentina and Canada.

Explaining about heritage railways, our general aims, aspirations and goals. Now you may well say did that bring in money for the railway and I must admit in the case of our overseas visitors I doubt it. but, perhaps some of our locals and UK connections learnt something new, perhaps we sowed seeds of interest, you never know. To survive heritage railways need young blood, we need keen young minds that can approach things differently.

One of the visitors to the cams, mentioned how few youngsters were to be seen, there were some but the percentage did not look that great.

So perhaps next time you see a young visitor, stop and say hello, communicate with them and show interest. Now I am aware many do this but equally many do not. It costs nothing but it can reap rewards.

So lets enjoy the rest of Flying Scotsman’s visit and not forget Britannia straight after it.

Have fun and with luck it will be a great year not only for the railway but also for each of us.

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Britannia 70000 to Visit the NVR

We are pleased to announce that 70000 Britannia will be visiting the NVR from the 11th to the 18th March.

This is one of the first of our visiting locomotives as we celebrate Rail 200 under the theme of Best of British.

The locomotive will undertake a Photographic Charter, Driving Courses, a full running weekend with an evening Jolly Fisherman “The Britannia”. All details are on our web pages.

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Tornado is with us.

Well Tornado has arrived safely at the railway. On Friday it will be on driver experience, and at the weekend it is pulling public services.

Will be a good busy weekend, if you plan to visit then I hope you have a great time.

Currently it’s facing east towards Peterborough.

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GBRf weekend.

This weekend sees a joint event with GBRf, full details are on the NVR web site.

The weather forecast is good and the railway will no doubt be busy. Its events like this that I miss being involved in, but still being confined to the house I can only watch on the webcams.

So if you do plan to attend the event have a great time a,n should you wish to send me pictures for the blog then they will be most welcome.

Please take a few minutes to look at the railways web site to see what other events are planned, I am sure you will find something of interest.

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It could be weird on a Wednesday.

Opening on a Wednesday at Orton Mere could be very unpredictable, We could be busy or totally dead, there were rarely days in-between.

Weather was not a factor either we have had wet days and been busy all day, then we have had nice sunny days and been totally dead all day.

Most business on a Wednesday was not from train tickets, it was from people passing, such as cyclists, dog walkers and the like. We always found that cyclists were often a strange breed, they ranged from the silent ones to the cycling fanatics, who would want to give you every last detail of the bike they were riding, they could out talk diesel fans with their desire to give you details. right down to the valves keeping the air in their tyres. Dog walkers were normally a friendly bunch, and the ones who said their dogs were no trouble normally had the worst ones for yapping, often constantly. Often you could hear them as they passed the signal box. But they often bought something to munch and drink for themselves together with a bottle of water for the dog. Many were regulars as well and seen most weeks.

So if you ever visit and travel on a Wednesday keep and wye out for those cyclists, they don’t take prisoners.