A post dedicated to the world’s last ocean going paddle steamer.
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to another installment in my series about my holiday in Scotland. The steamer has been mentioned/ shown in various previous posts (Setting the Scene,The Museum of All Shells and Friday Overview) but this one is dedicated to it. There are a few other pictures as well.
THE STEAMER
Alighting from my parents camper van in Kyle of Lochalsh I was just too late to get the whole steamer in shot, but I did get this picture:
I had not expected to see it again, not knowing the route it would be taking, but that evening it passed by Ferry Cottage, all be it on the opposite side of Loch Alsh, so I was able to get plenty more pictures of it.
SOME EXTRA PHOTOGRAPHS
Here are the remaining photographs from Friday evening.
Welcome to the latest post in the series I am doing about my holiday in Scotland. This post brings to an end the account of The Jacobite train journey.
THE LAST STAGE OF THE TRAIN JOURNEY
Once we were able to move on from Glenfinnan we encountered no further hitches and the train chugged into Fort William at 3:55PM, within a few minutes of the stated return time.
A FEW FINAL THOUGHTS
ON “THE JACOBITE”
This is unquestionably a very fine train journey, and to experience it on a steam train added something to it. However, I have to disagree with the ‘selectorate’ who named it The World’s Greatest Train Journey. Inlandsbananin Sweden is one that I rate ahead of it, the other section of this same railway, Glasgow to Fort William, is as impressive in its own way, sweeping across a moor that sees it at one point seven miles from the nearest road, and as you will be seeing later in this series of posts the rail route from Kyle of Lochalsh to Inverness is pretty special as well.
The account of the first half of the return journey on The Jacobite.
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to the next post in my series about my holiday inScotland. This post commences the coverage of the return journey from Mallaig to Fort William on The Jacobite.
EXPLANATION
Why am I covering the return journey? Because although I was still on the non-ideal side of the train, rge fact that the locomotive runs around the train to be attached to the opposite end did mean that I was facing the direction of travel for the return journey, which meant that I got more and better photos than on the outward run.
MALLAIG TO GLENFINNAN
Although we would not be stopping for long enough for anyone to disembark on this return journey we would have a stop at Glenfinnan to allow a regular service to pass us. Thus, Glenfinnan once again forms a logical break poiny.
Welcome to the next post in my series about my holiday in Scotland. This post covers the hour and a half at Mallaig that The Jacobiteallows.
MALLAIG
Naturally, I commenced proceedings at Mallaig by taking the opportunity to get some photos of the train:
I had noticed the presence of a Heritage Centre close to the station. Unfortunately such is the extent to which Mallaig has embraced its status as a tourist trap that they were charging for admission, so I got nor further than the gift shop.
The rain eased sufficiently for me to explore a little further.
While on the train I had purchased a souvenir route map. In Mallaig I also bought a pictorial map of Skye and Wester Ross:
An account of the Glenfinnan-Mallaig section of The Jacobite journey.
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to another post in my series about my holiday in Scotland. This post covers the second half of the outward journey on The Jacobite, ending with our arrival at Mallaig.
HEADING WEST
Although we did not stop between Glenfinnan and Mallaig, two stops before Mallaig on the regular route is Arisaig which has the distinction of being the westernmost mainline railway station on the British mainland.
ARISAIG – MALLAIG
The finish of the journey provided few photo opportunities, although travelling back the other way (a journey I had previously made on a regular train in 1993) made up for this.
The locomotive at Mallaig station – there are more shots of this to come in my next post, this being an aperitif.
An account of the Fort William – Glenfinnan section of The Jacobite journey.
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to the next post in the series about my holiday in Scotland. Today we deal with the first section of The Jacobite journey, including a stop at Glenfinnan.
ON THE TRAIN
The train was full, although of course on a journey of this nature no-one was made to stand by the time we got under way exactly according to schedule. The limitations that an aisle seat facing against the direction of travel impose on photography notwithstanding I did get some pictures.
The first station beyond Fort William
The first of two shots that I got featuring the Glenfinnan Viaduct on the outward journey.
A view from the Glenfinnan Viaduct
Approaching Glenfinnan station.
AT GLENFINNAN STATION
At Glenfinnan we had a stop of about 20 minutes. There is a small museum there, but I did not venture in. Unfortunately the circular walk was too long to accomplish in the time available, so I acquainted myself with the station and augmented my stock of photos. I was not going to take any chances time wise because we had been warned when we needed to back on the train by, and such warnings need to be backed by action, i.e leaving late returners behind, if they are to have any force.
Ironic that the London and North Eastern should be featured here given that as you will be seeing in a later post while North we are most certainly not East.
The Jacobite at Glenfinnan station .
The Oban branch diverges from this line at Crianlarich, between Glasgow and Fort William.
Setting the scene for several posts about The Jacobite.
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to the latest installment in this series of posts about my Scottish holiday. We have reached the Thursday, on which day my parents were scheduled to look at houses in the Fort William area (about two hours drive from where we were staying) and I was hoping that The Jacobite, a steam train journey from Fort William to Mallaig, an hour in Mallaig and then back, would be available as a way to fill my day.
THE PRELIMINARIES
The advance bookings for The Jacobite had closed, but tickets were available for purchase on the day. With this in mind we set forth from Ferry Cottage at about 7:30AM. Barring the very start of it I had never previously experienced the route between Glaick and Fort William before, and although the best pictures I got of it were on the way back having mentally noted potentially good possibilities on the way down, I did get a few pictures on this journey.
The white spots at the top of this hill are unmelted snow.
FORT WILLIAM STATION
We got to Fort William station just after 9:30, and an inquiry at the ticket office saw me pointed to a queue for the train. I joined this queue although I was not expecting success (I was assuming ill-fortune so that I could not be disappointed, only get a welcome bonus). However, as time passed and the queue moved forward with no-one being turned away I began to speculate on the possibilities. Then came the moment when I was the next person to be served and I thought that it would be seriously rough luck to miss out at that juncture. I was duly issued with a ticket and took my place in coach C. Lady Luck’s support had been limited – although I had a seat it was an aisle seat facing against the direction of travel, which meant that taking pictures of the journey would be a challenge.
The Jacobite, Fort William StationInside Coach CSlightly blurred, but proof that even from an aisle seat I could take pictures through the window.The ticketThe back of the ticket.
An account of the NAS West Norfolk day at the beach hut.
INTRODUCTION
I am taking a one-post break from my series about my holiday in Scotland to cover last Sunday’s NAS West Norfolk activities centred on the Mencap beach hut at Old Hunstanton which we had for the day.
GETTING THERE
Having checked on google maps to remind myself of the distance between Hunstanton and Old Hunstanton I decided to get the bus to Hunstanton and walk from there. Having a choice between Stagecoach and a local operator (Lynx) I naturally decided in favour of the local operator. This decision was rewarded with a fare that was less than I would have paid on Stagecoach:
For a sunny Sunday in June the traffic was quite light, and the bus reached Hunstanton pretty much on schedule. I then set off on the walk to Old Hunstanton. I have stated before on this blog that the shortest route is not always the best on my reckoning, and this was another situation where my chief criterion was not shortness. For reasons that I will not insult the intelligence of my readers by elucidating my sole criterion for choosing my route was to stay as near the sea as possible.
Old Hunstanton Beach. I initially failed to identify the correct beach hut, but after a few minutes scouting I was noticed by one of the others.
PRE-LUNCH – THE LIFEBOATS
Having got to know the beach hut some of us took the RNLI up on their kind offer of a tour as they explained about what they do, their boat and their hovercraft. This latter is one of only four in the whole country. The boat has to be towed into the water by tractor, and anyone familiar with north Norfolk beaches at low tide will therefore have little difficulty in understanding why the hovercraft which is an amphibious vehicle is sometimes necessary.
I took these first few pictures before the initial tour – the building was open and no one attempted to stop people from looking.
One of the bits of equipment the beach hut have – a wheelchair specially adapted for going to the beach (btw it did get used as we had someone who uses a wheelchair in our group).
Net at the beach hut
The beach hutIdentifying a lunch spot.
The first layer of a lifeboat person’s gear – this one is for warmththis wetsuit with built-in wellington boots goes on next to ensure that you don;t get absolutely soaked.
The ensemble is completed with a helmet that has a ;protective visor and a lifejacket with a few extras.
The cab of the tractor – it has two steering wheels and multiple openings.
This tractor has particularly large wheels – that is me standing next to one of them.
LUNCH
I went to the Ancient Mariner for lunch, and it was quite excellent. I also had an outside table, which meant opportunities for taking photos.
Cliff face viewed from Old Hunstanton beach
A pint of Adnams Ghostship – excellent for a sunny day in June
These are a subject of some controversy – personally I find this view, which shows humans at long last attempting to take care of their planet to be a lovely one.
Post 2 in my Scottish holiday series (there will be more later today). This post describes the journey there.
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to the second post in my series about my holidayin Scotland. This one focusses on the first day, when I travelled from King’s Lynn to Kyle of Lochalsh and then walked across the bridge to Isle of Skye, where I stayed the night at Saucy Mary’s Lodge.
THE FIRST LEG OF THE JOURNEY-
KING’S LYNN TO PETERBOROUGH
With my envisaged train for the next leg of the journey leaving Peterborough at 9:46 and the bus journey reckoned at 1 hour 20 minutes or thereabouts I decided that prudence dictated being on the 7:34 rather than the 8:04. The journey ran fairly smoothly and I arrived at Peterborough Train Station at just after nine o’clock.
PETERBOROUGH TO EDINBURGH
The 0:946 to Edinburgh Waverley, scheduled to get there at 13:20 arrived in time and was not absolutely packed, although it is clearly a popular service. I got a window seat in a designated quiet coach (both parts of which represent significant bonuses to me – the latter even more than the former). This was the start of the portion of the journey that is not so familiar to me, and also therefore represented the point at which the camera got pressed into service…
Taking photos through the windows of moving vehicles can be frustrating (and all bar a few taken when the train was at rest were taken thus)
On the approach to York, the first stop after Peterborough
At Darlington, one terminus of the world’s first passenger carrying railway, the Stockton & Darlington.
A first glimpse of the sea just north of Newcastle
Edinburgh Waverley
EDINBURGH TO INVERNESS
A slightly late arrival at Edinburgh meant that I had to move fairly fast to make the change to the train to Inverness. A combination of the fact that some idiot at Scotrail (part of Abellio, the profit-making subsidiary of the Dutch state railway company) had deemed three carriages sufficient for this train and the heat of the day made this leg of the journey like travelling in an oven on wheels. However, neither of these factors kept me from taking photographs…
INVERNESS TO KYLE OF LOCHALSH
Arriving at Inverness over half an hour late I then discovered that the train I had expected to catch to Kyle of Lochalsh was being replaced by a bus service. There were two different buses, and there was some confusion of who should go on which, but we set off at the appropriate time. I continued to ply my camera…
My first sight of the Skye Bridge, and a by then very welcome sign that the journey was nearly complete. When I first travelled this way in 1994 there was no bridge, just a regular ferry crossing.The approach to Kyle of Lochalsh, with Kyleakin visible in the distance.
THE WALK TO SKYE
It was still pretty hot even at 8:45PM as I began the walk to Saucy Mary’s, which according to my instructions was 2.5 miles. The reason for this is that the bridge to Skye actually starts a good half-mile beyond Kyle of Lochalsh, is itself a longish crossing and then on the other side one has to go back along the Skye shore to Kyleakin which is directly opposite Kyle of Lochalsh. I arrived at Saucy Mary’s thoroughly exhausted and went straight to reception. There I was greeted with news that I had been relocated from my dorm bed to a room normally used only by staff. The reason for this was that the people who had booked the other four beds had revealed at the 11th hour, having not mentioned it while booking, that they were travelling with two babies, and the manager had decided that it was unacceptable to put me in the dorm room in that circumstance (absolutely right, and thankyou very much).
The two manifestos to which I refer are those the Labour Party and the We Own It Campaign. In this post, which as a purely political post features text that alternates between red and green I will share links to some of the posts that the Labour Manifesto has already generated, and links to both manifestos and some of my own thoughts.
THE WE OWN IT MANIFESTO
This is a must-read document about public ownership. At the end of the document there is a link to click to enable you contact your candidates to ask them if they will support these measures – I have just done so. As a sampler, here is the section on Railways:
As a coda to the above I point out that most of our railways are in the hands of profit making arms of other countries state owned railways – the Dutch state owned railway by way of Abellio operates more track in this country than there is in the whole of the Netherlands.
THE LABOUR MANIFESTO
I recently shared the draft version of this manifesto with you, The final version was released yesterday, and is every bit as good as expected. The screenshot below shows the scope of the document. Please do read it in full – primary sources are always better than secondary, even on those occasions when the authors of the secondary sources don’t have axes to grind.
MORE ON THE LABOUR MANIFESTO
In this section I will share four links to posts concerned with the Labour Manifesto:
The Skwawkbox have produced a piecethat combines commenting on the Labour Manifesto with showing the sheer desperation of the Tory response to it. This post also has an excellent accompanying graphic, reproduced below:
I have no objection to tactical voting where such represents a chance to be rid of a Tory. In certain seats, notably Brighton Pavilion which they already hold and the Isle of Wight among others I would unhesitatingly call for a vote for the Greens, given that they have stepped aside in no fewer than 30 seats to improve Labour chances there and that I have a great deal of time for the Greens. In my own constituency of North West Norfolk there is only one way for any progressively minded person to vote – for Labour Candidate Jo Rust. Make sure you use your vote on June 8th.
PHOTOGRAPHS
Just a few photos to end this post:
Lot 1107 in James and Sons upcoming auction.1107-a – A Northern line train of 1956 stock.1107-b: The last two items in the album.Mama duck with her brood, the Gaywood River near Beulah Street.
aspiblog 