Spring Day Out Part 2

The second part of our weekend on Sunday afternoon after visiting the Stonehurst Farm Museum was to give the Great Central Railway a 'look in'.

According to their web pages, no steam was scheduled to be run that day, but.................... look no further!

This photo was taken from the road side across Swithland water towards the viaduct.

D1705 (Sparrowhawk) A Brush built locomotive in Loughborough, 1965. Some 500 plus of this type of locomotive were built for British Railways.

3850 A Swindon built class 2884 locomotive. 16th June 1942 this 2-8-0 locomotive was in service in the Bristol area.

2807 Another Swindon built locomotive. Class 2800 2-8-0 built in 1905

Now and Then

On Saturday 16th April, one of many steam excursions passed through near by.

Standing by the canal at Brinkworth, near Rugby, Princess Elizabeth a Crew built 4-6-2 locomotive, built in 1933 for the London, Midland & Scottish Railway (LMS) hauled an excursion from London to Chester.

In these poor photos, (we were shooting into the sun) a Virgin Pendolino precedes the steam run. These departures are from Rugby.

Spring Day Out Part 1

This last Sunday, 17th April, I visited the Stonehurst Farm Museum, Quorn, Leicestershire.

We have been meaning to visit this place for some time but never really found the time.

However on a lovely Spring Sunday morning Matt Bisp and I decided to take a look, and we found a little gem of a place.

Needless to say it is a family attraction so there were lots of mums and kids, but fortunately we arrived well before the hooligans turned up. I took a number of photographs for you to enjoy.

This is truly a remarkable recreated rural scene of a road side country garage and filling station.

There is a small covered part of the museum with everything shoe horned in place. We understand that a second shed is to be built with the same amount of exhibits yet again!

Outside in the sunshine we found some rural pastime agricultural examples.

Welcome to the world!

The second part of this day out will follow with a sample of photos taken on the Great Central Railway.

New Tractor Club

Last Saturday 9th April we visited the inaugural and opening ceremony of the new 'Blue Force' vintage tractor club.

The weather was perfect and the setting brilliant. The hosts were Ben Craig and his family at the Vale of Belvoir Vintage Machinery premises.

Refreshments were lain on, we presented our club stand and besides the statutory raffle, there was also a club merchandising stall.

A vast number of visitors attended along with a tremendous selection on Fordson and Ford tractors and commercials.

Matt Bisp accompanied me and we both joined this new club and enjoyed the experience very much.

The Ford Motor Company of Detroit gave permission for the famous 'Wheat sheaf' Fordson logo to be used. Please enjoy the selection of photographs.