Best railtour names

[StephenHunter]

What do you think are some of the best names given to a railtour?

I like this upcoming Pathfinders one,

The Exe-Parrett - Pathfinder Railtours

Enjoy a lovely day to the West Country, hauled by steam, featuring a number of climbs along the way to really test our locomotive. Joining Stations: Dorridge, Birmingham New Street, Bromsgrove, Worcestershire Parkway, Cheltenham Spa, Stroud, Kemble, Swindon

www.pathfindertours.co.uk

This tour name may strike a definite chord with Monty Python fans (by pure coincidence of course!), but in fact reflects two important rivers in Somerset and Devon that are crossed along our route.

We start our day diesel hauled at Dorridge, with Joining stations through the Midlands and Gloucestershire to our final pick up at Swindon, where we also swap to our steam locomotive for the journey to Exeter.

 

[Bertie the bus]

I've never taken much interest in railtour names but I thought The Bristol Coal-Stone Haul that visited a coal import terminal and quarries in the Bristol area was quite clever. It was a superb railtour as well.

Six Bells Junction

Colston Hall was a prominent building in Bristol for those who don't know. It's now been renamed.

 

[DaventryRabbit]

Some from the past, courtesy Pathfinder..
The Looe Brush
The Paignton Decorator

 

[Forty29]

The Paignton Decorator
The Par-snip
The LukersAide(apologies if spelt wrong)
Skirl of the pipes 1 to how many it went too

 

[xotGD]

The Ayr Restorer

 

[eastwestdivide]

The LukersAide(apologies if spelt wrong)

Leuchars Aide (as in the place in Scotland)!

 

[Denis103]

The Long Thin Drag.

 

[yorksrob]

The Long Thin Drag.

Agreed.

Also wins "tour I'd do if I could go back in time" as well.

 

[alastair]

the Walsall Concerto. 1987

 

[The Bear]

The Cumbrian Mountain Express

And

The Forth and Tay Bridge's.

 

[The exile]

The Rex Ham
The Wool Witch (as we went all the way round the coast on the way from Charing Cross to Weymouth I assume we passed through the "long version" fairly early on - and definitely went through the short one!

 

[12C]

The ‘Bone Breaker’ class 58 farewell in 2002 was very appropriately named as it ended up hitting the buffers at Walton on the Naze, and actually broke some unfortunate passengers bones in the process.

 

[Ashley Hill]

Two of the old F&W ones, the Cheshire Cheeser and The Yorkshire Pudding (my first tour).

 

[61653 HTAFC]

The Long Thin Drag.

Sorry, but was that one so named because it used a 33/2? Or was it the Hastings DEMU?

A brief explanation of the name would probably help for all of them, to be fair.

 

[Harpo]

My first railtour on 16/9/78 was ‘The Three Way Special’. I don’t recall any sniggering.

 

[Sun Chariot]

Sorry, but was that one so named because it used a 33/2? Or was it the Hastings DEMU?

Hastings DEMUs. Two 6-car sets (1011, 1032), plus the power cars from set 1001. A fourteen car beast. I saw it chattering along the southern end of the WCML.

 

[Galvanize]

Loopy Doughnut
Tugging Shedmaster
Cwm and Go

 

[eastwestdivide]

Sorry, but was that one so named because it used a 33/2? Or was it the Hastings DEMU?

A brief explanation of the name would probably help for all of them, to be fair.

Long Thin Drag. The Long Drag = Settle/Carlisle, thin because Hastings units.
The highest and furthest north for those units!

 

[Welly]

There was a weirdly names tour called "The Intrepid Treacle Eater" mentioned by Dave Maxey in Rail during the 1980s - did that really exist?

 

[Tester]

Showing my age, but the Rambling Rose and Hampshire Hog - Railway Enthusiasts Club tours in the 1960s.

 

[Denis103]

There was a weirdly names tour called "The Intrepid Treacle Eater" mentioned by Dave Maxey in Rail during the 1980s - did that really exist?

That could have been the 'Intrinsic Treacle Eater' 19th Nov 1986

 

[Sun Chariot]

I travelled 12-May 1990's Vladivostok Avoider with 20010 + 20132 at the helm. We ventured to Scarborough and also a myriad of Yorkshire lines. Cracking tour.
We definitely didn’t go to Vlad' - but I can't for the life of me remember what the tour's name rationale was.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 20 Jul 2025 ==

What do you think are some of the best names given to a railtour?

If you have an hour or two, go to Six Bells Junction website. Page The Railtour Files has, split by year, every single known tour and special eorking. What, when. the name, the traction, the route. The madder names came the mid 1980s onward.

 

[Galvanize]

Long Thin Drag. The Long Drag = Settle/Carlisle, thin because Hastings units.
The highest and furthest north for those units!

Apparently, that tour was almost never going to happen. The original plan in 1986 was in fact to run a DEMU farewell tour to Paris…yes Paris in France. It would have used the train ferry from Dover to Calais and traversed SNCF lines.

BR and SNCF were both well up for it, the issue that made it a non-starter, the Train Ferry no longer had a certification to carry passengers, and even if it did, apparently didn’t have the right tides to carry the load.
The idea was abandoned, so a new plan was formulated, that being to Carlisle over the S&C!

I wonder if HDL will ever consider a re-run of the Long Thin Drag, perhaps next year considering it would be both 40 years since the “Hastings” DEMUs finished on BR, and 30 years since the preserved set returned to the main line!

 

[D6130]

I travelled 12-May 1990's Vladivostok Avoider with 20010 + 20132 at the helm. We ventured to Scarborough and also a myriad of north east lines. Cracking tour.
We definitely didn’t go to Vlad' - but I can't for the life of me remember what the tour's name rationale was.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 20 Jul 2025 ==



If you have an hour or two, go to Six Bells Junction website. Page The Railtour Files has, split by year, every single known tour and special eorking. What, when. the name, the traction, the route. The madder names came in from mid 1980s onward.

Possibly because it was going just about everywhere except Vladivostok?

 

[Sun Chariot]

Possibly because it was going just about everywhere except Vladivostok?

Possibly. It certainly helped me "clear" several routes on my British Rail Sectional Maps.
That's a thought: I'll have a look in the loft, to see if I even have it still. Eight moves and 35 years, since I last used it...

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 20 Jul 2025 ==

I wonder if HDL will ever consider a re-run of the Long Thin Drag, perhaps next year considering it would be both 40 years since the “Hastings” DEMUs finished on BR, and 30 years since the preserved set returned to the main line!

That would be epic. I missed out on the 1986 tour; I had to "make do" with seeing it pass my locality. Mind you, HDL is five carriages short of the original...
Attached photo shows HDL's April 2025 "East West DEMU" tour, formed of their 9 operational vehicles.

 

[Forty29]

Leuchars Aide (as in the place in Scotland)!

Of course it was!
How could I forget The Ayr Restorer?

 

[74A]

There was the Ewell Log run over a Christmas period one year. Made a stop at Ewell East on order to justify the use of the name !

 

[D6130]

There was the Ewell Log run over a Christmas period one year. Made a stop at Ewell East on order to justify the use of the name !

Did it also stop at Ewell West on the way back?

 

[Welly]

That could have been the 'Intrinsic Treacle Eater' 19th Nov 1986

Even odder name than what I remember!

 

[Peter Mugridge]

There was the Ewell Log run over a Christmas period one year. Made a stop at Ewell East on order to justify the use of the name !

...and here it is, at Ewell East at 09.00 on 14th December 1985, with 73 001 leading. ( first two pictures )


...and here is the Vectis Velocipede, surely a contender for the corny railtour name competition, on 21st June 1986; which coincided with a Network Day event so a lot of people did the tour outwards and used the NSE day ticket afterwards in stead of going back on the tour. Poor quality picture... a 110 format camera was never going to give brilliant results was it?!

First third picture: 53359 at Epsom at 09.39, having run via Ewell West.
Second fourth picture: 54442 at Portsmouth Harbour at 11.07

Thank you to the dratted automerge for messing up the picture descriptions!!!