Things you would like to do again (even if impossible)

[4SRKT]

Bash the 'A' class in Ireland.

Done this. Lots of times

<is smug>

Including one time after getting dumped by a v. attractive girl in Dundalk and having to get the Sunday morning train back to Belfast with my tail between my legs (the 'train ride of shame'), in the days when it was the only diagrammed 001 class turn on the Belfast line all week.

<is less smug>

 

[LMS6202]

Thing I would like to do once again is repeat 1966 and stand the on District line platforms at Wimbledon and see a Spam Can hurtling Londonward at very high speed [perhaps 90mph] The one I saw had a knocking con-rod and the rapid clonk, clonk, clonk is something I'll never forget.

 

[royaloak]

Line speed through Wimbledon on the UMFL is 75mph

 

[LMS6202]

Line speed through Wimbledon on the UMFL is 75mph

Seemed a lot faster than that in 1966.. That engine was really hammering along. Maybe it was not Wimbledon but further out.. Definitely remember seeing it though.

 

[GNERman]

oh and see this happen again

(this cud be my best vid ever, taken in the summer)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jt2ufxImQNY

 

[starrymarkb]

The old Lotschberg Route

Video starts just after leaving Brig
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHCODOdDkkc

Very impressive climb (train started on the valley floor) - it is still possible to do this route, but only on the new Lotschberger units - Loco hauled and expresses use the new Base Tunnel (equally impressive but 22 miles of tunnel doesn't have the views)

 

[ChrisTheRef]

I'm so young!

I'm going for my 5 hour First Class pendolino trip from London to Glasgow in 2007

 

[Rugd1022]

So many memories I'd love to relive, the more I think about it the harder it is to pick just one.... so the first one which came to mind on opening this thread will do :

Travelling from Padd to Penzance in the summer of 1975, with D1028 as far as Plymouth, getting off the train and wandering up the front to watch it come off and be replaced by D1056, then jump back on and enjoy a second dose of Maybach magic on the slow but noisy run to Penzance. I know everybody and his wife goes on about ''the long hot summer of '76'' but as far as I'm concerned '75 was every bit a scorcher too.

Nidge )

 

[AlexS]

Travel from Wareham to Poole and back on a class 442 on the last ever trip out I enjoyed with my grandad on a hot summers day.

Catch one of the big Intercity trains to Exeter or Weston super Mare on a summer holiday as a small boy.

Catch a class 310 out of Wolverhampton on an all stopper to New Street (or Manchester for the very lucky, ha).

Do the only time I got on a 309 again, Wolverhampton to Manchester Airport, for my first holiday abroad, back in 1999.

Walk on to the platform for a day trip to London to see a class 87 standing proudly at the head (or I suppose rear 50% of the time!) of a rake of coaches, looking like a real express train.

Get 37429 on some rotten old Mk1s on a day trip from Wolves to Chester zoo.

Watch the signaller at Pelham Street box shunt a 156 from one side of the station at Lincoln to the other to return to Leicester.

Managed to do all of them in the last 20 years and I'd give quite a lot to manage any of them again.

 

[SouthEastern-465]

Travel from Wareham to Poole and back on a class 442 on the last ever trip out I enjoyed with my grandad on a hot summers day.

Catch one of the big Intercity trains to Exeter or Weston super Mare on a summer holiday as a small boy.

Catch a class 310 out of Wolverhampton on an all stopper to New Street (or Manchester for the very lucky, ha).

Do the only time I got on a 309 again, Wolverhampton to Manchester Airport, for my first holiday abroad, back in 1999.

Walk on to the platform for a day trip to London to see a class 87 standing proudly at the head (or I suppose rear 50% of the time!) of a rake of coaches, looking like a real express train.

Get 37429 on some rotten old Mk1s on a day trip from Wolves to Chester zoo.

Watch the signaller at Pelham Street box shunt a 156 from one side of the station at Lincoln to the other to return to Leicester.

Managed to do all of them in the last 20 years and I'd give quite a lot to manage any of them again.

Lucky getting getting to travel on the Ex-GE Class 309! Was it still in NSE livery or in the (Than) new airport livery?

 

[37401]

Go on that trip to scotland again, ICS 43 up the WCML to Glasgow then 304 blue train to Ayr, Id also go back and do the many leaps between BHM-BHI on 86s and 87s

 

[Bittern]

I'd like to travel on a 303 again. Unfortunetly, only one is in preservation now, I beleive, and that's at the non-electrified Bo'ness railway.

They used to operate on my local line, and I was able to use them often (but I always prefered the 314s). Looking back, I do wish I could travel on one again. I'm fortunate enough to still use the 314s on an (almost) daily basis, so there's that at least.

Even in Hornby modelled one (preferablly both) of these classes, that'd please me!

Also, something I'dl ike to do again that's far from impossible, but very likely, is travel behind the power of a steam locomotive. I've only ever done it on the Isle of Wight Steam Railway and once at the Bo'ness Railway, but a railtour behind an A4 (preferablly Mallard, but that's not going to happen!) would be the most awesome thing ever.

Oh, and travel on a 221. Done it once from Motherwell - Glasgow Central. Loved it and would like to do a longer journey on one!

 

[LE Greys]

My grandparents used to live in Thorrington in Essex. Every now and then, they would take me to the level crossing and watch the 309s go by (including the strange ones with a pantograph over the cab). The crossing keeper would sometimes let us stand on the old station platform beside the line (it had railings). I never travelled on a 309, but always wanted to. If I could go back in time, I would change that.

 

[flymo]

Many summer holidays in the early eighties were 14 day all line rovers so most of my things come from then.

So many memories of bashing the Network South East area on the electric units back then, there was something about them, whether it be the sound of them or the smell or whatever but I really enjoyed those units. Still remember rattling down the mainline from Waterloo to Portsmouth and bouncing about on those seats.

I'd love to do the 1st gen DMU's again getting the front seat. Best runs ever in the front seat were Newcastle - Carlisle - Barrow - Preston and Par - Newton Abbot.

Loco hauled MkII's with open windows on the Glasgow - Inverness and Inverness - Thurso lines, even in the depths of winter.

Summer Friday/Saturday overnighters from Newcastle to Paignton or Penzance. Even had HST's on these.

Marvellous.

 

[SouthEastern-465]

If I had the chance I would go back to the late 1990s (1998 -to- 1999) and go back to that trip I had to Hastings as a kid, on a Class 423 VEP with that MK1 smell, and than the Class 365 (While on express services on the SE) on the way back. That was a great day on that MK1 EMU, wish I could do it again.

 

[Drsatan]

Oh, and travel on a 221. Done it once from Motherwell - Glasgow Central. Loved it and would like to do a longer journey on one!

Once I travelled on a 221 from York to Southampton Central and absolutely hated it. The 220s/221s are completely unsuitable for XC services IMO

 

[Spagnoletti]

Under the Mersey on a 503. Don't see many units with wood panelling any more

 

[Bittern]

Once I travelled on a 221 from York to Southampton Central and absolutely hated it. The 220s/221s are completely unsuitable for XC services IMO

Okaaaay...? The one I was on was Virgin.

 

[Techniquest]

Motherwell to Glasgow is too far on a 221! Wanting to go even further than that? There's men with white coats on their way to bonnie Scotland now...

 

[33056]

XC class 221 = former Virgin class 221, exactly the same!

 

[transportphoto]

Get on a Clean FSR 170 - what an change to what I am used to!

 

[mrcheek]

Sort of cheating, but I wish I had found out that ALRs existed a few yaers before I did, so that I could take some cross country journeys on 47s or HSTs, before all those nasty Voyagers took over. Used to love it when I would do a local rover, and get on an old 47 from Bristol to Exeter or something.

 

[ungreat]

Work 45 106 to St Pancras from Leicester again..glad I took my camera that day.

Or a pair of 20's on a coal train again

Or be the class 56 pilot on a train running in class 60s..they always failed on test runs!

Or,and this one most of all..to be in
the mess at Leicester with all my old mates that sadly have passed away..miss you all

 

[Bevan Price]

The reduction in popularity of bashing as a hobby clearly goes hand in hand with the reduced number of locos. I recall that bashing was something close to a mass movement in the 1980s, with every summer Saturday extra packed with excited blokes and boys going to Skegness, Great Yarmouth, Aberystwyth, Scarborough and many other destinations to sample the 20s, 37s, 40s or whatever. Judging by the [small] number of times that any bashing clip gets viewed on YouTube, and by the fact that it's always the same faces on railtours, I don't think there can be more than a few thousand bashers left, at most.

Modern traction bashing grew steadily after 1968, when steam fans were looking for something else to do. You saw fewer crowds, though, because there was so much variety that they were not all in one or two locations at the same time. In the early 70's, apart from local stopping trains and a few long-distance / express routes (e.g. Trans Pennine dmu's), most trains were loco-hauled. For example, you could go from Penzance to Wick without ever using a dmu. And about 15 new locos for haulage in one day on my first diesel era trip to Scotland in 1973........

Nowadays, I record the units I travel upon, but I can't see myself going to Penzance or Norwich just to get my last 150 or 153 ride.

Bevan

 

[455driver]

Very true Bexan, when I hear young enthusiasts getting excited about a 158, I think "what that thing are you mad", and then I realise, I am now those steamy lot that gave me the disapproving looks when I was a lad

 

[Bittern]

Growing up with the "modern" stuff, I gladly "bash" them - including the 158s, 455driver! XD. I recently did a trip to Ayr just to enjoy the 318s quite a bit (and holy crap, being at high speed on a 318 for about a half hour was awesome!) and am damn excited to do it again on the 380s!

Although I am much more attracted to steam as they are my number 1 interest, hobbywise. Sadly, the only steam I've ever been on was on the Isle of Whight railway every year for 13 years straight, and once at Bo'ness when I was very young (I can only remember the train being double headed, and one loco was black. I got in the cab of the black one). II don't love them. 37s am less excited about deisels, but that's not to say I don't love them. I hope to travel behind D3510 at Bo'ness sometime soon (of course, Morayshire takes priority however).

So basically, I'm known to get excited aobut almost anything railway-wise, except those horrendous tampers and that piece of crap leaf-removal...thing!

 

[455driver]

My post was more of a dig at myself and how I have moved from being the disapproved to the disapprover . Getting older you see, but each to their own .
I dont knock them at all, if they enjoy the modern scene then good on them, but I dont find it AS interesting now as I did in my youth (a long time ago), but I still phot and take an interest.

 

[4SRKT]

My post was more of a dig at myself and how I have moved from being the disapproved to the disapprover . Getting older you see, but each to their own .
I dont knock them at all, if they enjoy the modern scene then good on them, but I dont find it AS interesting now as I did in my youth (a long time ago), but I still phot and take an interest.

I'd go along with this. In my youth such things as 37s etc seemed so normal that it was impossible to imagine that it would ever come to an end. Still more impossible to believe would have been that almost everything would one day be operated by DMUs, and the chance to get hauled by a bodysnatcher would have people prepared to get on a train at Holyhead at half five in the morning!

I think the biggest difference is that locos had some personality compared to modern DMUs. Also, they were built in Britain (of course this goes for first generation multiple units as well), which provided additional pride/interest for most people. Lastly, the whole thing was much more relaxed than now, with H&S and CCTV everywhere it's impossible to get as up close and personal as it was then. How many friendly drivers would let you drive their loco (sorry, unit......) up and down a siding now? Something that was hardly uncommon in the '80s.

 

[Vulcan]

I remember back to the 90s with class 47s in Virgin livery on cross country services, and in Intercity before that and think 'I wish I'd known then that the service would be taken over in 10 years by a fleet of smelly DEMUs.

RE things I would do again, even if impossible: Fly on Concorde again.

 

[455driver]

Go back to the mid 80s and do a freedom of Scotland again, 25s, 26s, 27s as far as the eye could see and all in passenger service pulling mark 1 coaches, marvellous!