Aln Valley Railway

We've been to the Aln Valley Railway in Alnwick before, but given they are building new bits on the site and extending the line at a rapid pace, we wanted to pop in and see how things were looking after a couple of years.  In the intervening time since our last trip, they'd rebuilt a big chunk of the running line towards Alnmouth, so the ride was consequently longer than on our first visit.

Being a weekday, services were in the hands of "Drax", an industrial look-a-like to the BR Class 04, running with a brakevan.  And it also happened to be in use for "Driver for a Tenner" sessions between timetabled trains.  Well, it would be rude not to have a go, wouldn't it?

Father-in-Law is in the cab in this shot- two runs up and down the station/yard.  After he'd had a go, myself and Elder Child got in the cab, me driving and her working the air horn.  Great fun, and my first time driving a diesel loco... I'm rather feeling I've missed my calling in life.

After we'd finished playing with their train set, we had a little while to wait before catching the timetabled service down the line.

One of the newly-arrived locomotives, an Austerity tank, waiting for overhaul.  Being a weekday there were no steam locomotives running, but then I'm the sort of nerdy railway enthusiast who really likes industrial diesel shunters anyway so no matter.

Plenty of scope for photographs from the veranda of the brakevan on the run down the line... unfortunately there was a minor mechanical problem with the loco on this run (I hasten to point out it was working fine when I last touched it), but the vols and staff on site were exceedingly friendly and helpful all day, getting us back up to the station and giving us a free drink to make up for the disrupted journey.  Hopefully by the time we're back in another couple of years they'll have the route all the way to Alnmouth; given their hard work, they deserve every success with this venture.