Not Fat Enough

The clocks went back in the wee small hours of Sunday morning, so I got an extra hour in bed, sheer luxury.  Even with the clocks having one back, it was still dark when I arrived at Toddington to clean Foremarke Hall and it was raining intermittently.  The forecast for the later on in the day was of the kind that urges responsible citizens not to make non-essential journeys.  Fortunately traveling to Toddington for a cleaning turn is regarded as an essential journey, so I could disregard the weather warnings with a clear conscience:

7903 and 2807 slumber on in the dark

I'd make the mistake of bringing along a clean pair of overalls, my others were so befouled with oil, grease and grime that they formed a pretty effective barrier to rainfall.  The newly washed ones that I had bought with me this week would simply soak up the rain and leave me cold and bedraggled.  You can imagine my delight, when I inspected Foremarke Hall by torchlight and found that she was gleaming from top to bottom.  Subsequent inquiries have revealed that on Saturday, Dan, Tonia, Nick, Andy B, Phil, Steve J, Laurence and possibly others had spent the day giving her a thorough clean.  I felt a bit of a fraud as I struggled to find something to do. I even had to resort to making the crew a pot of tea.  My grateful thanks to all concerned.  

It wasn't just Foremarke Hall that was running on Sunday, 2807 was down to haul the dining train.  As mentioned earlier, the weather forecast promised all sorts of unpleasantness and the rather exposed footplate of 2807 is not the best of places to be in a downpour.  Jonathan greeted me with an offer of swapping engines when he arrived.  I declined.  Not only was Foremarke Hall's footplate much better sheltered than 2807, my loco was already clean, and this was likely to be my last opportunity to ride on Foremarke Hall before her boiler ticket runs out.  She is only booked down for turns for the rest of this week, and after that, will probably only run if one of the other locos fails.  There is rumour and counter-rumour as to whether or not she will run on the first day of the Christmas Cracker gala, which is the final date of her boiler ticket.   

Jonathan may have been keen to swap, but the Andy, the fireman for 2807 when asked about his views on the deluge to come and the lack of shelter in the cab seemed quite undaunted:

Andy ready to face all that the British weather could throw at him

Later on, from the relatively dry and comfortable cab of Foremarke Hall, we distinctly heard the words "You bastards" as we glided serenely past 2807 and her rather damp looking crew at Winchcombe.  Reporting that the voice sounded remarkably like that of the head of training would be something of a career limiting move, so I'll refrain from mentioning it.

I'm leaping ahead of myself though, Paul and Jonathan got into a lengthy debate about the relative virtues of LMS, Southern & GWR locos.  Foremarke Hall listened on in a dignified silence:

Paul and Jonathan

I chose to take advantage of the wet conditions and take a few vaguely arty reflection shots of Foremarke Hall using various convenient puddles of water:

Foremarke Hall's nameplate

Front end

Smokebox

 Steve and Paul were the rostered driver and fireman for the day:

Paul

Steve getting a caffeine fix before we set off

Paul very kindly threw the shovel in my direction for the first round trip, which as this was a pink timetable day included the run up to Laverton loop.  It wasn't my best performance, but we got there and back without the need for either a blow-up or blowing off.  As usual, no photos taken by me when I was firing.  Paul however took plenty of photos which will doubtless end up plastered all over a certain well known social media website in the near future

Second round trip, setting off from Toddington

Entering Greet tunnel

I've noticed that some crew members skulk in the darkest recesses of the cab whilst in Greet tunnel these days to avoid joining the 'crew by firelight' gallery.  Not so with Paul and Steve, I quite like how these turned out:

Steve

Paul

As forecast, the weather varied between bright sun and driving rain.  None of our steam locos come equipped with windscreen wipers, which at times rather restricted forward vision:

Spot the signal

Determining the state of signals often required sticking your head out the side of the cab and into the rain.  Running tender first presented its own problems in that department too.  The storm sheet that we had hurriedly erected before setting off in the morning was a snug fit over the top of the tender which didn't so much reduce vision as block it completely.  Paul had the solution, jam a broom between the door of the tender and the storm sheet to provide a window to see through.  As the wind was coming from the other direction and was probably traveling faster than we were, no appreciable rain came in though the gap:

A broom with a view

Needless to say when the footplate needed sweeping to clear up the coal dust, we lost our view ahead, so it had to be done quite rapidly.

Passing 2807 and her bedraggled crew at Cheltenham

I seem to be acquiring a notoriety that spreads far beyond the borders of the steam loco dept.  As we were leaving Cheltenham, the signalman spotted that I had my camera in my hand and ducked out of sight saying "No fear, I know where that will end up".

The lair of the camera shy signalman

The day before, had been the day of the Halloween special services, 'steam & scream', people dressed up as witches etc.  Just in case all that wasn't quite scary enough, they also had a Dalek at Winchcombe station:

Photo courtesy of Neil Carr

Being of an age where I can just about remember watching Dr Who from behind the sofa, I was hoping that the Dalek might still be around on Sunday, but no such luck.  I was curious as to what might have made it choose to visit Winchcombe station in the first place, and can only surmise that it was around to visit some of its distant relatives that I noticed sheltering from the rain under the footbridge:

Dalek's relatives?

It's probably just as well that it wasn't there any more as I had neglected to bring my sonic screwdriver with me, and I didn't fancy getting exterminated.

Occasionally the fireman is permitted by the drivers to drive the loco on the run round of the stock.  Paul had a go at Laverton:

Coming back into Laverton loop

Paul is a passed driver on the Swindon & Cricklade Railway, so is no stranger to the other side of the footplate.  Just before this run round, we had all been discussing one of the volunteer announcement emails asking for helpers as Santa during the upcoming Santa Expresses season in the run up to Christmas.  I can't remember the exact flow of the conversation now, but the memorable line from Steve was "You're not fat enough to be a Santa Ray".  For me, compliments are few and far between (probably with good reason), so I made a note of it.  Paul meanwhile decided to try to negate Steve's comment by buffering up as close to the stock as possible.  It's a bit of a tight fit between carriage and loco at the best of times, I had to breathe in before going under  to hook on this time!

Fat man's agony

Running up to Laverton and back gave a few unusual photo opportunities for me:

Approaching Stanway viaduct

Entering Toddington from the north

You'll notice in the photo above that there is a fair throng of people on the platform. Amongst those traveling on the train would be a number of people from Foremarke Hall's owning group.  I was expecting that a couple of the owners would be wanting to travel on the footplate for this last round trip.  This would be a last chance for many of them to do that before she is out of traffic and facing a major overhaul. I was a bit surprised to find that none of them did until we got down to Cheltenham.  It seems that the cream tea that was waiting for them in the carriages was more important. If I'd been them, I'd have grabbed my scones and tea and taken them onto the footplate.

Once more off down the line...

... and through Greet tunnel

Cream teas consumed, they finally took their place on the footplate when we arrived at Cheltenham:

Two members of the Foremarke Hall group

Jim Clark of the Foremarke Hall Group

They can of course be extraordinarily proud of their collective achievement.  Returning Foremarke Hall from Barry scrapyard condition to a working loco is no small task and not only that, they did it so well that she has been an extremely reliable performer over the 10 years since she first entered traffic in her preservation career. 

Two more people on the footplate means that there is no room left for the cleaner, so for the first time in ages I got to travel on the cushions. 

If you're going to be in one of the coaches, you might a well do it in style

The guard joined me for a while in the compartment for a chat.  Mercifully he didn't ask me for my ticket as of course I didn't have one, and my work permit was back on the footplate in my bag.  It's always interesting to talk to people in other departments within the railway.  Nick as it turned out comes to the railway from north Essex for a weekend once every six weeks.  It's quite a long way to go, and there must be many other heritage railways that would be far closer for him, but he likes the friendly nature of the other volunteers here.  Quite a nice testimony I thought.

I rejoined Paul and Steve on the footplate at Laverton.  Once we'd got back to Toddington and unhooked from the stock, Steve said "well let's see if Ray know's how to do it".  Apparently that was my cue to drive Foremarke Hall from platform one onto the ash pit for disposal. Part of fireman training these days includes knowing how to stop the train in a station, just in case the driver has become incapacitated whilst the train is running. It hasn't formed part of my formal fireman training yet, but no doubt it will do sooner or later. It's taken for granted that you won't want to try to revive the driver, mouth to mouth resuscitation would be an extremely unappealing prospect, so the next best thing is knowing how to stop the train safely. I surprised myself by mostly getting it right (opening the large ejector while the brake air valve was still open wasn't a good start).  I even managed to stop her in the right places, but that's probably not too difficult when you're light engine and running at slow speed.  The important thing is that I stopped her on the pit with room to get under and empty the ash pan rather than ploughing on into the machine shop.   All in all a cracking way to remember what will almost certainly be my last turn on Foremarke Hall in her current boiler ticket.  Not many people get to fire, drive and travel first class behind an engine all on the same day.  

It will take some while before she returns to traffic with another 10 years on her boiler.  If you'd like to help the Foremarke Hall owning group, they will always be grateful for financial donations to help bring that day a bit closer.  I have no doubt that they'd be keen for more volunteers to help with the work as well.

2807 and Foremarke Hall on shed at the end of the day