Tractors and locos.

 Unbelievable! Still into summer and the stove had to be lit! Proper arctic it was last night, even firing up the diesel heater didn't help. Only took the chill from the air but to be comfortable we threw in a firelog. Soon we were toastie warm.....well, a bit too hot really....ended up opening the front doors to cool the place down! Seems we just can't win.

So now let's get back to yesterday.

The reason for this mooring was to see the steam loco trundle past. But Saturdays timetable for the  Battlefield Line showed it to be the diesel engine running. Ah, but what a good opportunity to find the best place to see the loco on the 'morrow.

A very short walk took us to the railway viaduct. Not a bad place to take photos, as was the lane on the other side of that bridge, but I had looked on Google Earth to see if there was anything better.

 

And there was. A left turn at the junction, along the lane for about quarter of a mile, cross into a field via a public footpath, over a stile and hey presto we were at the line.

Don't much like the look of those dips in the track!

Good, this will do nicely. Set off back to FS to find the moorings were filling up fast, must be a popular spot at weekends.

Today then, having timed the walk to the track we left by 10.40am. The steam loco was due to leave Shackerstone at 11am. Gosh, we were lucky on the walk because suddenly all these tractors appeared. There must be an event somewhere.

Eventually arrived at our chosen spot, settled ourselves next to the line (before anyone starts to have kittens, a public footpath crosses at this point) to await the locomotive. Nearly 7 minutes late it finally turned up.

Having gone past and been waved at by the passengers (quite an experience to be so close to a moving locomotive) we decided to head back to the viaduct and await its return.

Obviously no turntable or cross over line at Shenton so having to pull backwards. 

Ian took this video on his new phone.

 

And this from the mooring. Could someone cut those trees down please?

 

Tomorrow we move on, would have stayed another day but fishing here is awful...no, worse than awful...non-existent! Need to find a good fishing spot. Have all this bait and nowhere as yet decent to use it!

And wildlife

Silver Y moth