Happy New Year

I was hoping to herald the New Year with the first picture of the Eaugate Light Railway earning its keep. Unfortunately the high winds have discouraged me from spending time in the garden so the fitting of fish plates has fallen behind schedule by a couple of days. It is a case of so near but so far. Just getting  a couple more track panels down will make a big difference in getting the track to a viable length, however temporary it might be.

My joy at the New Year, when many of my friends seem to have had life changing events, is somewhat tempered by the news that both Martin and Geoff were both taken ill over the holiday period.

My very best wishes to both of you for a full recovery.

Teddy has actually been hard at work over the weekend, working both garbage trains and taking logs to be split and stacked, and along the way totally proving the minimal railway concept in my eyes . Doing the same job without the railway would have reduced the garden to a quagmire.

I've been impressed by my wife's reaction to the railway. It is fair to say that future investment has been secured  and that the reality has far exceeded her expectations. I almost had to stop her giving Teddy a saucer of milk this morning when she opened the kitchen door this to see him waiting outside.

The very first light engine working with proud new owner

Bus replacement service

The first proper working. Xmas empties to the bin store

The bunting was already up

Hauling logs, with the skip body replaced by a plastic crate 

Compost bin, leaf pile, log store, bins and coal bunker all now served by rail

Pretty much the entire line. Not a bad view to wake up to.

Eaugate Light Railway

The imminent delivery of Teddy led to a rather dark and extremely windy evening of emergency track laying on Monday night. Fortunately simplified by the short term use of Ride on Railways portable track connectors.

So when Chris Dixon of CMD Engineering  delivered the loco this morning there was at least some track to test it on.

Needless to say I'm very very pleased with it. It runs very smoothly and controllably. Although I went for the modern Loncin engine rather than the Suffolk Punch I think it still sounds rather nice. I must add the obligatory Scamp bicycle horn though to scatter any poodles on the line.

It was a bit of a challenge getting it into the engine shed at the end of the day, since the railhead is currently around 60 feet and 90 degrees away from the limit of shunt, but I managed it using the traditional approach  of  swapping track panels around.

Big Boys Toys

Xmas is fast approaching, at least if I believe the TV adverts, though with another trip to India planned before then I've still not put away all my Summer clothes.

However Xmas always make me think of toys. Frankly it is quite annoying that we are in the awkward gap between children and grand children so I've no excuse to buy toys for them that I really want to play with myself.

So that means justifying buying toys for myself.

Now my last post was definitely a toy, the GVT tram loco. And to be honest I regret it. Yes it is a lovely model, but I haven't even bothered to steam it yet.

Meanwhile though this is taking shape...

The combination of a Colin Edmondson design with Chris Dixon's production expertise.

Not a toy, obviously, because it is going to earn its keep hauling logs, bird food and garbage around the garden.

Progress

Not mine, which is as glacial as ever, but progess in the world of 16mm narrow gauge railways.

Here is my first new 16mm live steam loco for over thirty years. An Accurcaft GVT loco commisioned in conjunction with Anything Narrow Gauge and made in China.

I haven't steamed it yet, and my out of the box impression is that is rather nice, apart from the usual abomination of having a hard to ignore pressure gauge facing forward in the cab. At least being a tram loco forwards actually means backwards when running. The lining is a little OTT as well.

Here, in total contrast, is my very first 16mm loco, a Merlin/Beck Midas  hauling a GVT coach buit from the old Association GVT coach "kit" on a Mamod chassis.

Possibly a fairer comparison is with the Gosling GVT loco that I lusted after as a schoolboy.

Treemendous

Trees are funny things. Except when they are a little bit scary or spooky. 

Or Ents. I can't imagine an Ent telling a  joke, and if they did the punchline would be a long time coming.

This twisted example is to be found high up on the Burren and I took the photo on a particularly brutal day off from cycling around County Clare and missing evidence of the West Clare.

What has really made me think about trees is first of all the recent excellent BBC documentary on a year in the life of an oak tree  This includes some incredible statistics and should be a must see for anyone contemplating realistic trees. DId you know they have 700,000 leaves?

The other thing is watching our new garden as Autumn approaches. There is a point where we seem to lose the ability to look at individual trees. One tree, two trees... four trees, five trees....lots of trees.

I actually still haven't counted how many trees we now have under our care, but as they begin to change colour I'm finding it easier to pick out individual specimens,  I could stand and look at them for hours,

Ch Ch Ch Ch Changes

There was a time in my life when I moved house on a regular basis and took it in my stride. So I've been bit taken a back by how stressful I've found this latest move, particularly since the move itself went without a hitch and we both adore living here.  Sometimes though even good changes generate stress. That is especially the case when one change sets in motion a domino effect in many aspects of life, which is what seems to be happening now.

To give just two apparently trivial examples, having moved somewhere flat I've exchanged one of my bikes, an old and much loved 21 gear hybrid, for a single-speed bike in a rather fetching shade of electric blue. It is radically altering my how approach to cycling and I'm loving every minute I spend riding it. The catch is that because of all the other pulls on my time I'm struggling to find the time to put in the miles I want to.

The same applies to photography. To be honest I've never been the most successful landscape photographer but even so I've been really struggling to get to grips with Fenland. It isn't that the scenery is unattractive and boring, far from it, but somehow I can't yet capture the images  that my mind is seeing.

On the bright side I get to practice  taking lots of sunset photos whilst leaning on the garden fence, and there are some great agricultural buildings around.

Meanwhile on the railway front I'm still focussed on the garden but after over tens years with hardly any garden at all I'm struggling to work out how to fit things in. I've worked out a location for the 16mm test track but it isn't a long term solution.

The 7 1/4" gauge line also needs a lot of thought, trying to balance avoiding it being too public or intruding on the garden too much whilst also doing a useful job of work.

New Beginnings

So the house move is completed. The dogs are having the time of their lives, as is one of the cats, though the other one is less certain, and the cycling is a dream.

And track laying has begun.....