The Keighley and Worth Valley Railway held their steam gala in March- we booked tickets to ride on the Saturday. In previous years I (Ben) have tried to attend on the Friday as well, line-siding for 'train in the landscape' shots... but I'd only a few spare days off from the Day Job free in 2023, and anticipating poor weather and generally bare, dead surroundings, I decided to skip the Friday.
And then on the Thursday it started snowing, and kept on snowing. Come Friday morning, and the road off our street was rather deep in the white stuff. A phone call from work confirmed I'd be able to stay off and work the time back later, so in between snowball fights with The Childs and walks with Amy to get landscape pics, I was able to get some train shots near the house. The first train of the day is seen above, between Damems and Ingrow.
...and later on, 1054 and 85 head a train with some of the lovely vintage stock past the same spot, as the snow stopped and the weather started to brighten.
By late morning it was beautiful in the valley.
Snow and blue sky more than made up for the bare trees; 52044 and 85 between Damems and Ingrow.
My favourite station, Damems, and "Leander" slows for a stop around lunchtime.
At the crossing. By this time, more and more photographers were starting to appear, and we were starting to get a bit cold, so headed back for a brew.
By mid-afternoon, we were able to get off the street (albeit with some difficulty), and the roads had been cleared as far as Haworth. We nipped up for a little stroll around the village, a few pics, and trip to the shops for some bread and milk. 52044 and 85 once again in Haworth.
The goods train hadn't run on Friday due to the snow, but I was up early to see it pass on Saturday.
We then spent the day enjoying riding the trains; there were an awful lot of photographers about, as well as the general public, so we left them to it pictures-wise and just enjoyed the day as passengers.
Sunday saw me up bright and early once again, this time with Elder Child; she was after some wildlife shots, I wanted "Bahamas" putting in a rare turn on the goods train. The weather was noticeably poorer, and there was less snow about by this point.
A nice and moody shot to end the weekend on; I didn't think I'd be able to top the bright and sunny pics from Friday, and was content to leave it at that.
I don't often get shots published from gala events (as there's about three-thousand photographers in the valley), but Heritage Railway happily went for one of my shots, from before the weather brightened up on the Friday.
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