Anglia Plus 18th May 2013

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On the 18th May 2013 I did a track bashing trip to tick off all rail lines in the Anglia Plus region, so here goes a trip report. Pictures for this part are attached.

My day started with 170 203 on the 09:07 departure from Lowestoft to Ipswich, which I took as far as Beccles, where I had a three minute connection time, from photo's I had determined the front carraige to be best for a +3 connection over the bridge at Beccles, luckily, the incoming train was delayed and so I had time to grab a couple of photos of 170 203 at Beccles, 156 407 was the train which took me back to Lowestoft.

At Lowestoft I had been hoping the train from Ipswich would be the one which went to Norwich, but my luck was out, and so I had to change to 156 417 at Lowestoft on the 09:50 service which left bang on time and arrived at Norwich a minute early. With time to spare here, I spent a bit of time photographing the ins and outs before heading out to Morrisons about a 5 minute walk from the station. After picking something to drink, I caught a 25a back to the station and found my next train in the station.

This was 156 409 on the 11:36 to Great Yarmouth via Reedham and Berney Arms, the Berney Arms branch was my first bit of new track for the day, on arrival at Great Yarmouth, I hopped off and took a few photos before getting back on in the front carraige to help with my connection at Norwich.

Upon Arrival at Norwich, I had 9 Minutes to make the connection to the next London Train, which I took at 13:00, I was sat in a refurbished MK3, which made me want to stay on the train all day, unfortunately, my tickets validity ran out at Ipswich so I left the train and waited for the next train of the day.

 

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Eventually, 153 322 turned up and took me to felixstowe where once again, I left the train to get some photographs and then it took me back, and upon arrival back at Ipswich I had 27 Minutes to train spot including doube 86's on freight duty.

After my 27 Minutes 170 205 took me onwards up to Cambridge, where after an on time departure from Newmarket, we arrived there 5 minutes early and were held outside the station and arrived into a platform 2 minutes early.

 

[Trainfan344]

At Ely, My trainspotting friend who had caught 170 205 up to Ely before it had continued to Cambridge boarded and sat opposite me, we then settled down and chatted for the journey to Brandon. After around 15 minutes of waiting at Brandon, what we had came here for arrived, the sight of the HST on the railtour from Hoe to St Pancras, after this passed at around 30mph, (not the 90mph we had expected it to), we crossed platforms so My friend could talk to the guard of the service train from Norwich to Cambridge, My friend and I then walked around Brandon a little before returning to the station to photograph the two EMT services that were due to go fast through the station in both directions. We were caught out by the Norwich bound one being a double set, but we managed to figure out that the front set was 158 799 and the back set was 158 847. We then caught a delayed 18:38 service back to Norwich, which although it didn't depart Brandon until 18:43, arrived into Norwich at 19:31 just one minute late.

Finally, I found that the unit to take me home would be 156 418 still in central trains livery, which left Norwich bang on time and arrived into Lowestoft four minutes early at 20:46.