The BeerTrain

The Portsmouth to Cardiff services were due to finish in May 1988, I and many of the Crompton roadshow were spending an increasing number of days out "on the Bash", sometimes using Leave & sometimes just going Sick from work! With so many booked turns to cover and mileage to accumulate, very little time was spent eating or drinking - no breakfast, food on the go during the day from chippy's and then little or no time for Beer! Saturday 31st October Unfortunately the brickworks where I worked had started working on Saturday mornings due to demand, as the only person trained on my Brick stacking machine this meant I could no longer leap on Friday evening for the 2252 Waterloo - Weymouth (booked a 33) but could only make the 1410 Waterloo - Salisbury on Saturday afternoon. EMU  Sittingbourne - London Victoria 44m 40ch 33108 Waterloo - Salisbury 1L09 1410 Waterloo - Salisbury 83m 43ch 33064 Salisbury - Fareham 1O43 1415 Cardiff - Portsmouth Hbr 38m 43ch 33048 Fareham - Ba...

Another (non-Easter) trip for the narrow gauge Alco's on the Peloponnese, south of Athens. A Roadshow of 31 Bashers including Flossie & Shovel accompanying me for most of the trip.  The really good news was that the main daytime hauled turn, although still terminating at Pirghos, then formed a service to Kiparissia. No more taxi's required to the hotels in Olympia, the Ionian hotel outside Kippy station very much back in use! Thursday 4th March 2004 91107       Doncaster – Kings Cross   0746 Newcastle – Kings Cross   156m 319429     Kings X TL – Luton Airport Parkway   1004 Brighton – Bedford   30m G-EZJB   Luton Airport – Athens   1340 Luton – Athens With a full evening here in Athens I expect we had a night in the Posh Brewpub in the City Centre, hellfire range of German style beers, including a great Schwarz (Black) beer & food like Schweinhaxe's to eat. A home-from-home! Friday 5th March 2004 A9106 is attac...

WHERE AM I ...who am I...what time is it? These were my first thoughts upon being awakened on a clear morning in July 1991: Friday the 12th of July to be exact. "Richard, phone call" came a voice I recognised as belonging to my mother. "What's the time?" I asked. "Twenty past five" came the reply. Heavens to Betsy, I thought as I struggled out of bed, I've only been asleep for 4 hours. Myself, Tim Reiner, Gibbo & Rich Pinker had attended the Weekly Wind Up at the Evening Star in Brighton the night before - at least I got home, unlike Mr.P! I pulled some clothes on - no fashion reports in these pages - and staggered to the phone. "Poodle... I'm very nearly out of money... so I will say this only once: 0731 Ashford to Hastings, 0913 Hastings to Ashford, 1012 Ashford to Hastings and so on and so forth all day." By the time my brain had bestirred itself to decipher the first word, I had missed all this, so I had to ask for an action r...

By the time you read this we should hopefully be in the grip of reasonably temperate English weather, so in order to get in the spirit of it all, what I suggest is that you crack open a can of soup, put on a scarf, and sit in front of an open freezer door. CD's of dashing troika bells are, of course, an optional extra... Wednesday 6th February 1991 When it snows anywhere in the world, life tends to carry on as normal. Even in the UK, the Scots regard it as the frozen equivalent of water off a duck's back, and the "Eee it's grim oop North" merchants carry on regardless. But when it snows south of Watford it's a.... NATIONAL CRISIS! Thus when the snow started falling on Wednesday, 6th February 1991, our splendid Third Rail network fell apart as can only be expected when the elements have the dashed awful cheek to mess about. It's just not on! I was on a work course all week in the Hilton hotel in Basingstoke, and hearing news of the gradual collapse of rail ...