Club members (l to
r) Mike and Pat Beavis, Betty and Brian Parkes board the Train at
Pages Park Station
Every September for
the last 20 years, a group of club stalwarts have gathered for what is usually
a bit of a mystery tour. Its designed for people who like to use
their cars for going to the pub rather than to stand about in a
drafty field all day. This year we assembled on Sunday lunchtime
at the "Colney Fox", London Colney, for lunch. Those
arriving early got served relatively quickly, but this is such a
popular venue that those who arrived later were struggling to finish
their lunch before the time for off.
The reason for the rush
was that this year we had a train to catch.
The pre-planned route
took us the most direct, but prettiest, route we could find. It
was difficult to avoid the City of St. Albans, but once we had
negotiated that, it was off into the country and pretty
Hertfordshire lanes bathed in glorious late summer sunshine.
The route took us
through Redbourn and then Great Gaddesdon (twice!) (Someone seems to
have renamed the village of Jockey End as Great Gaddesden, which
must confuse the locals!. We then dropped over the Chiltern
Escarpment near the White Lion, and into Dagnall. Here we picked up
Tony Coates and family who were lying in wait for us. The remainder
of the route took in the villages of Edlesborough and Billington,
before arriving in good time at Pages Park Station, home of the
Leighton Buzzard Steam Railway. We all bought tickets for the
six mile return trip. Whilst the railway is fine, its now rather
hemmed in by suburban development. That means that for most of the
route, the view is just of unimpressive back gardens on housing
estates. The turn-around is a more interesting affair as there
is a small museum about the history of the railway, and snacks and
cups of tea.
Then all there is to do
is go back to Pages Park!
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It's a yellow section, that
means its designed for Broadband users. If you have a slow old
modem it might take a couple of minutes to download each
video clip. |
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The Parkes's
Standard 14 moves off
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Lynda pilots
the Flying 12 Drophead Coupe
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Train Buffs
Section: |
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"Coupling
up!"
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"Shunting"
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If you are not a
broadband user, you really should get it immediately, you will wonder why
you used to waste so much time waiting for pages to download. |
Whilst there is no
formal competition at the Rally, we do reserve the right to present
the "Chiltern Cup" to whoever the judges (Lynda and I)
think is the most deserving. This year it went to Peter Foster and
his magnificent Pennant, for no other reason than we liked it!
