Yearly Archives: 2008

Monday 29th December 2008

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Merry Christmas to everyone, I hope you had a good one! The week between Christmas and New Year is normally dead for freight workings but one working I was pretty certain that would be running was the Avon binliner especially as there had been two days holiday meaning a backlog of refuse to be shifted to landfill.

The weather was glorious with plenty of sunshine so I decided to head out, there are plenty of spots on the Great Western mainline to phot this working but I opted for the view at Shrivenham. This working has become somewhat erratic over the last few months as now this runs as required usually 2-3 times a week and even when it does run its path can vary by up to a couple hours. I arrived early which was lucky as the train was also running very early with 66621 doing the honours hauling 4V60 Calvert – Bristol passing Shrivenham at 13:01.

This will be my last update for 2008 so I wish everyone a Happy New Year! :-)

Saturday 18th October 2008

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It’s the weekend again so it must be time for the fastline coal train! Someone at Fastline HQ is playing ball as I awoke to find 66303 would be doing the honours on todays working. Intially I was only planning on heading out locally to Culham as it was pretty murky out but driving down the road I noticed the clouds were breaking up so I changed direction and headed off to Denchworth on the GWML hopefully to get a better phot.

It has been a long time since I have ventured out to Denchworth for phots, mainly due to the new bridge that replaced the original a few years ago. The view is probably better now than before although parking is now trickier due to the barriers that now line the bridge. I wouldn’t be stopping long so that wasn’t too much of a problem. While waiting for the Fastline coal 60076 trundled along on the 6B33 Theale – Robeston empty tanks although unusually straight down the main line in cracking light!

66303 had been reported 41 minutes early at Bristol Parkway but it must have been held enroute presumably at Swindon as it passed me at Denchworth running only 10 mins early at 13:08 in a very lucky patch of sun which it had been chasing all the way from the old Challow station site far in the distance! Right, so when does the boat with 66302 dock, four down, one to go! :-)

Saturday 11th October 2008

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Another week, another Fastline coal train and another brand new location for this website. I was off this weekend so I had to chance to get out lineside further West so decided to try the shot at Brinkworth which looked promising. After last weeks murkiness the Sun had returned once again, I seem to be getting pretty lucky with this working so far.

I arrived at Brinkworth just after 12:00 to find a couple of other photters already waiting for this working. Luckily after the farce a couple of weeks ago when it was delayed nearly two hours todays working was running slightly early and glided almost silently around the curve with 66304 at the helm of 6M90 Avonmouth – Ratcliffe in glorious light, lets see what happens next week.