16CSVT2700
Established Member
Hey guys and gals!
This is a little story about me and Tom's Newcastle HST trip!
It all started at Burnham where we got the 1011 to London Paddington one stop to Slough where we changed for the 1037 HST. Of course we (or should I say, I) wasn't sure if it was guaranteed to be a HST.. Of course knowing my luck itwasn't and it turned out to be a packed and standing Adelante (180109 I think).
So we stood in Coach B on the buffet area from Slough to Paddington counting random things:
Me: Gantry..
Tom: Signal..
Me: AWS ramp..
Tom: Turbo..
Me: Overhead lines!
Tom: Sleeper-sleeper-sleeper-sleeper!
Me & Tom: ROFL
On arrival at Paddington (1059) we got the Bakerloo line to go to Blackfriars (we were going to do this to do an "exotic" route to Kings Cross.. or so we thought..). Turns out there was engineering or signalling problems so we were going to crawl to Oxford Street. "forget this" we thought and jumped off at Baker Street and got the Hammersmith & City/Circle line to Kings Cross St Pancras. There we dossed then randomly went up to Finsbury Park on 317348 Richard A Jenner. We stayed until the next Kings Cross train which was formed of 365523. So that killed about 30 minutes. After a bit of nedding we headed for platform two and were greeted with our steed for the day.. 43110 and 43038:
We stored our stuff in our seats and headed to the vestibule areas where we awaited departure time.
1230 and we were off! The driver notched up as much as he could to get the HST moving making sure not to go over the 15mph limit through Gasworks Tunnel. Going through the tunnel the speed limit increased and the driver whacked open the power controller and the train made a right racket when exiting the tunnel! I waved to a driver who was waiting a path into the station at the end of the tunnel as we exited.
Me and Tom engrossed ourselves in some heads-out which was pretty difficult considering the linespeed.. almost a full 125 from Finsbury Park northwards.
After a while we arrived at Peterborough at 1321 (running 5 minutes late.. not bad);
Newark Northgate at 1353 (8 mins late);
A rainy Doncaster at 1420 (11 mins late);
And at York Zoltán joined us for our nedding trip. Heading north we chatted about various crap as per usual heh.
At Darlington I quickly took a picture of Tom and Zoltán sitting in their seats hehehe;
We paused at Durham (1545, 14 late) where I took this pic of the scenery in the rain;
Not long after we were entering Newcastle and crossed the River Tyne;
At Newcastle we met Craig and Vikki, and also quickly said Hi to Richie but he was busy so we took the Tyne & Wear Metro to Monument so we could go to Katmhandu (a rock shop thing) where Tom bought some stuff. Of course we had to rush because our train was due to leave at 1655.. After looking around a bit we ran back to Newcastle Central and said bye to Richie before legging it to platform 4 to wait for our train back. It pulled in about 6 minutes late at 1701 and we promptly departed.
I took this picture after we cross the Tyne Bridge again;
The driver opened up the train to full power and we stormed away from Newcastle, passing Tyne Yard in no time at all. Tom and Zoltán went to the Restaurant to see if they could do some dining but we put off by the attendant being rude towards them. They came back and found me in coach G at Durham where we sat down and chatted again. Tom took this pic of me and Zoltán somewhere after Northallerton;
I look like I'm about to hit Zoltán.. lol.
The return trip weren't very interesting so we sat and chatted most of the time.. However a trespasser on the line at Darlington caused us to stop abruptly and lost us about a minute. When we got back to York I took this pic of Tom and Zoltán while we approached
Zoltán left us at York and we carried on heading southbound on our train. I took this pic leaving york station;
At points we both fell asleep for short periods cos the journey was a tad boring but nevermind! After Stevenage Tom took a picture of me doing some heads-out;
Lol I look so content...
We finally arrived back at London Kings Cross at 2046, about 26 minutes late. We then took the tube back to Paddington where we waited a while for the Night Riviera Sleeper train to arrive. It was hauled in by 47813 John Peel so we got some pics of that and the train loco, 57605. We got a quick pic of us next to 47813;
And as usual I look like a miserable git..
We had to wait until the 2247 train because that was the next one to stop at Burnham.. so we didn't get back to my place until about 2340.. Of course being totally shattered we didn't bother coming online and just went to bed.
And so concludes this brief (cough) summary of Jammy and Sproggy's Tour to Newcastle!
This is a little story about me and Tom's Newcastle HST trip!
It all started at Burnham where we got the 1011 to London Paddington one stop to Slough where we changed for the 1037 HST. Of course we (or should I say, I) wasn't sure if it was guaranteed to be a HST.. Of course knowing my luck itwasn't and it turned out to be a packed and standing Adelante (180109 I think).
So we stood in Coach B on the buffet area from Slough to Paddington counting random things:
Me: Gantry..
Tom: Signal..
Me: AWS ramp..
Tom: Turbo..
Me: Overhead lines!
Tom: Sleeper-sleeper-sleeper-sleeper!
Me & Tom: ROFL
On arrival at Paddington (1059) we got the Bakerloo line to go to Blackfriars (we were going to do this to do an "exotic" route to Kings Cross.. or so we thought..). Turns out there was engineering or signalling problems so we were going to crawl to Oxford Street. "forget this" we thought and jumped off at Baker Street and got the Hammersmith & City/Circle line to Kings Cross St Pancras. There we dossed then randomly went up to Finsbury Park on 317348 Richard A Jenner. We stayed until the next Kings Cross train which was formed of 365523. So that killed about 30 minutes. After a bit of nedding we headed for platform two and were greeted with our steed for the day.. 43110 and 43038:
We stored our stuff in our seats and headed to the vestibule areas where we awaited departure time.
1230 and we were off! The driver notched up as much as he could to get the HST moving making sure not to go over the 15mph limit through Gasworks Tunnel. Going through the tunnel the speed limit increased and the driver whacked open the power controller and the train made a right racket when exiting the tunnel! I waved to a driver who was waiting a path into the station at the end of the tunnel as we exited.
Me and Tom engrossed ourselves in some heads-out which was pretty difficult considering the linespeed.. almost a full 125 from Finsbury Park northwards.
After a while we arrived at Peterborough at 1321 (running 5 minutes late.. not bad);
Newark Northgate at 1353 (8 mins late);
A rainy Doncaster at 1420 (11 mins late);
And at York Zoltán joined us for our nedding trip. Heading north we chatted about various crap as per usual heh.
At Darlington I quickly took a picture of Tom and Zoltán sitting in their seats hehehe;
We paused at Durham (1545, 14 late) where I took this pic of the scenery in the rain;
Not long after we were entering Newcastle and crossed the River Tyne;
At Newcastle we met Craig and Vikki, and also quickly said Hi to Richie but he was busy so we took the Tyne & Wear Metro to Monument so we could go to Katmhandu (a rock shop thing) where Tom bought some stuff. Of course we had to rush because our train was due to leave at 1655.. After looking around a bit we ran back to Newcastle Central and said bye to Richie before legging it to platform 4 to wait for our train back. It pulled in about 6 minutes late at 1701 and we promptly departed.
I took this picture after we cross the Tyne Bridge again;
The driver opened up the train to full power and we stormed away from Newcastle, passing Tyne Yard in no time at all. Tom and Zoltán went to the Restaurant to see if they could do some dining but we put off by the attendant being rude towards them. They came back and found me in coach G at Durham where we sat down and chatted again. Tom took this pic of me and Zoltán somewhere after Northallerton;
I look like I'm about to hit Zoltán.. lol.
The return trip weren't very interesting so we sat and chatted most of the time.. However a trespasser on the line at Darlington caused us to stop abruptly and lost us about a minute. When we got back to York I took this pic of Tom and Zoltán while we approached
Zoltán left us at York and we carried on heading southbound on our train. I took this pic leaving york station;
At points we both fell asleep for short periods cos the journey was a tad boring but nevermind! After Stevenage Tom took a picture of me doing some heads-out;
Lol I look so content...
We finally arrived back at London Kings Cross at 2046, about 26 minutes late. We then took the tube back to Paddington where we waited a while for the Night Riviera Sleeper train to arrive. It was hauled in by 47813 John Peel so we got some pics of that and the train loco, 57605. We got a quick pic of us next to 47813;
And as usual I look like a miserable git..
We had to wait until the 2247 train because that was the next one to stop at Burnham.. so we didn't get back to my place until about 2340.. Of course being totally shattered we didn't bother coming online and just went to bed.
And so concludes this brief (cough) summary of Jammy and Sproggy's Tour to Newcastle!