Celebrating 50 years of the Tamar Valley Line

Richard Burningham, Manager of The Devon & Cornwall Rail Partnership has been in touch with details of a special series of events this coming weekend that some of you may be interested in…

A weekend of special events will kick off on Friday 1 June, with a  cake being cut on the 10 54 train from Plymouth to Gunnislake as it crosses Calstock Viaduct to mark the 110^th anniversary of the Viaduct and the railway between Bere Alston and Gunnislake opening.

The cake will be cut by Gunnislake and Calstock’s Cornwall Councillor Dorothy Kirk and Calstock Rubber Band will also be playing on the train.  Pieces of cake will then be handed to passengers.  The Rubber Band will also play on their journey into Plymouth on the 09 29 train from Gunnislake.

On Saturday 2 June, Les Deering, Tamar Valley Heritage Guide, will be leading a railway-themed walk, organised by the Tamar Valley AONB.  The walk will start at 11 40 from Calstock station, to coincide with arrival of the train from Plymouth at 11 32 and will finish in time to catch the 13 56 back to Plymouth. It will be around Calstock, focussing on the railway, history of the viaduct and East Cornwall Mineral Line.

Booking is essential, by calling 01822 835030 or e-mailing enquiries@tamarvalley.org.uk

Vintage bus trip – There will be a vintage bus trip from Gunnislake station to Okehampton station on Saturday 2 June, connecting with the 10 59 train from Plymouth and returning to Gunnislake and Calstock in time to get the 17 27 from Gunnislake and 17 39 from Calstock to Plymouth (arrive at 18 12).  The bus will stop in Brentor and Lydford and will pass the old stations at Brentor and Bridestowe.  There will be two hours in Okehampton and the Dartmoor Railway Supporters Association are running trains between there and Meldon.  The trip will allow a return train trip to be taken (cost of this train £5 adult).   The bus is a vintage single decker 1979 Western National Bristol LH, part of the WHOTT fleet   http://www.busmuseum.org.uk/

There is no cost for the bus trip itself.   There are a very limited number of seats available and booking is essential – please e-mail railpart@plymouth.ac.uk to book and mention if you will be taking the train to Gunnislake to connect with the bus.  Initially bookings will only be accepted from people who will be taking the train to Gunnislake to connect with the bus but, for those who will not be taking the train to Gunnislake, remaining seats after Wednesday lunchtime will be available to you.   Please book now and any seats will be allocated based on when your e-mail arrived.

More details along with a short history of the line  can be found here: http://www.dcrp.org.uk/celebrating-50-years-of-the-tamar-valley-line/

Time is short and seats are limited so if you want to join in please contact them as soon as possible!

Stars of the shows: 643HAA

643HAA is a very tidy little Bedford J2 with Plaxton Embassy 18 seat body new in 1963
It looked slightly different back in 2006:

Stars of the shows: L401VCV

L401VCV the first Dennis Dart new to Western National preserved in the original Badgers and Flags livery by Terry Partridge. This is my sons favourite bus - Terry is his hero!

Stars of the shows: FTT704

FTT704 Bristol K6A new in 1945 although the body was new in 1955. Has been in preservation since 1973 and it shows as she is in great shape and gave a good ride into Exeter, performing several trips, with full loads.

Stars of the shows: JFJ873

My favourite ride from the whole weekend was on this wonderful Daimler CVD6 with Weymann B35F body new to City of Exeter in 1949 as fleetnumber 73. Later renumbered 173 it wasnt withdrawn until 1966.

 

 

Stars of the shows: OD7497

One of the real stars of the day, and perhaps one of the most popular rides (especially with such great weather) was this fine old AEC Regent I new in 1933 and looking fantastic. Sounded great too. Real credit to owner Ron Greet.

(Sorry for the delay in getting this posted. I had used the blog post in advance system - but it seems I had not enetered the date and time correctly so it didnt appear as I had planned!)

Stars of the Shows: FDV793V

Bristol LHS6L ECW new as Western National 1563 January 1980 and then to Devon General in 1983 to 1986. Full history of the bus is here on Rob Slys pages.

Sister bus FDV790V is also preserved but in the much nicer NBC green livery as Western National 1560

Stars of the shows: KJD413P

Bristol LH6L new to London Transport in 1976 but sold on to Tally Ho way back in 1982 and used by them until 2006! Now owned by Terry Partridge and looking very smart in Tally Ho livery.

This last shot from Plymouth bus rally earlier in the year.

Stars of the shows: 672COD

Western National 600 672COD Bristol SUS4A ECW new back in 1960.

Full history here

Southern Counties page here and a great shot of the bus still in service based down at Penzance here

Stars of the shows: 759MDV

Another fine Bristol coach, this time Royal Blue liveried Bristol MW ECW 759MDV Southern National 1410. A full history here at Bristol.co.uk.

There are plenty of great photos of this coach elsewhere on the net:

Southern Counties has a full page here

Russell Baldock catches her coming out of Victoria Coach Station in 2007

WHOTT Event Exeter 2005 by David Gowns

Stars of the shows: 270KTA

Over the next week or so I will be showing off a few photos from WHOTT weekend - Kingsbridge and Exeter events. Each time I will highlight just one vehicle that made an appearance. This wont be all the buses that were there - just a selection concentrating on the more local buses and coaches.

I start off with 270KTA Western National 420

Bristol SUL4A with ECW C33F bodywork new in 1962. There is a full detailed history of this fine coach here at bristolsu.co.uk

Click the display above for a slide show of all my photos of 270KTA, not just the weekend ones or click the icon bottom right to go to the full screen show.

Of course the bus didnt always look this good - there is an interesting, if somewhat blurred shot of the bus under restoration here

Hot weekend

This "summer" I have been out and really caught the sun on three occasions. All three of these have been bus rallys!

Today I was at Westpoint for the WHOTT event with Zak who really enjoyed it. The weather was fantastic, even if the sun was too bright at times for photos!

I still have about 250 photos on my PC still to look at and sort out so I will give these events proper coverage during the coming week, but for now here is just a very quick flavour of the Kingsbridge running day:

Thanks once again to all organisers of both events and all the drivers and volunteers who worked so hard to make the events such great fun. Thanks to Plymouth Citybus for providing transport to the event for both of us today too, and driver Les and the rest of the group who made us so welcome on their bus.