19th – 22nd January – Scottish & Newcastle Trip

 19th – 22nd January – Scottish & Newcastle Trip

A little trip away to Scotland & Newcastle with mum for a little January getaway.

19th January – Sleepy Train

The trip began with the 17:59 service from Grateley towards Waterloo, running a few minutes late due to the previous train from Exeter being 25-odd minutes late (with SWR doing their usual in ripping out stops after Salisbury to get it back closer to being on time).  159016 rolled in being quite busy, and it only got busier at Andover before emptying out a bit at Basingstoke (passengers wanting Clapham Junction maybe).  An uneventful run otherwise into Waterloo where we headed towards the bus stop on Tenison Way turning down the first 68 for Euston as it was busy due to bunching with the following route 68 bus (with Abellio’s LT712) following which was nearly empty (and soon caught up with the bus we turned down).  We took this to Euston bus station, heading into the horrors of the railway station finding a seat to relax before the sleeper got called for boarding.

For reasons unknown, mum decided she wanted to try out the seats, hence why we were using the sleeper, otherwise I wouldn’t have considered using it for the cost of a berth is high.  The sleeper started to board, and we headed our way towards platform 1 locating the Inverness seated portion which was 75% full (including a group of lads who were loud & drinking cheap mass-produced lager who were told by the guard to keep it down otherwise he would have thrown them off at Crewe).  92018 was the loco up front where due to engineering works on the Trent Valley route it was diverted to run via Birmingham International then bypassing New Street going via Aston & Tame Bridge Parkway.  A nice little surprise which I didn’t notice was happening until the actual day.

92018 at London Euston

20th January – Inverness & Skye

The sleeper ran ahead of time, having a long dwell at Kingussie & Aviemore before running into Inverness station somewhat 20 minutes ahead of schedule due to the LNER service which it was due to pass in one of the snow-covered loops between Carrbridge & Inverness being delayed (it arrived 2 hours late on the Friday).  Winner 66758 was powering the train with 73966 providing the train power so a little bonus in terms of another GBRf 66 into my book.  At Inverness we made use of the extra time to pop to Morrisons for a little supply raid for breakfast related items before heading to board 158713 on the first train to Kyle of Lochalsh.

66758 at Inverness Station

This was a quiet service from the start, got quieter by the time it reached Dingwall (6 passengers on board including myself & mum) and entered a snow-covered wonderland of scenery.  Such beauty as the snow was melting in places making some of the hills look like zebras, the photos I managed to take simply can’t capture how beautiful the line was.  The only request station which the train called at was Duirinish as it arrived at Kyle of Lochalsh near enough on time as we headed for a gentle walk following a path following the A87 towards the Skye Crossing.   We crossed the Carrich Viaduct to the small island of Eilean Bàn where mum stopped to have a rest as the gradient onto the Skye bridge itself was quite steep (made worse with the strong wind).  Views were wonderful, although not as good as they could have been due to the sea fog.  After I walked to the roundabout near Kyleakin I did a U-turn back across the bridge (this time on the opposite side of the road), meeting up with mum as we made our way back towards Kyle of Lochalsh station going via the Co-Op for lunch items.

The whole Island of Skye (plus all the other various islands in the general area of the Hebrides is on my list for a decent explore, but that can wait until the weather is better & days are longer).  We didn’t have long to wait at Kyle of Lochalsh until 158708 rolled in from Inverness and we took a seat (making sure we sat on the opposite side of the train than before) for the beautiful run back towards Inverness, the light only starting to fade after Muir of Ord.  The train only really got busy after Dingwall due to the uneven timetable on the shared section between Dingwall & Inverness.

View from the Skye Bridge

Back at Inverness, and after swinging via Morrisons for a couple of items we headed towards the guest house on Greig Street where I had booked us a twin room, the Dunskaith Villa (a place I was due to stay early last year before getting an upgrade to the next-door property as both I presume are owned or managed by the same person).  A decent sized triple room (although the 3rd bed wasn’t made up), and after dropping off our bags we headed back into the city centre ending up at the Wetherspoons for dinner for lack of a better idea for food.

After dinner we headed back towards the guest house as the rain had started to fall, the end of a good first day of the break with some beautiful scenery along the way.  I do love the Kyle line.  What was unusual was that both Scotrail trains the guard asked to see our railcard and also scanned it, first time that has happened in a while.

View from Kyle line near Achanalt

21st January – Onwards to Newcastle before the Storm

In a way we got quite lucky as I had planned a night in Newcastle to break up the return journey, as it was the night storm Isha was due to land hitting Scotland quite hard.  Anyhow after checking out of the guest house, we headed to Spoons for breakfast (is it bad that my most used Spoons is likely the one in Inverness?).  After a filling Scottish breakfast, we headed towards Inverness station to locate our seats on the Kings Cross service formed of 800111 for the run south.  As it’s a Sunday it called at near enough every station to Perth (skipping only Dalwhinnie) with a short delay around Pitlochy due to the track layout and a late running northbound HST.  Some beautiful views along the way, especially around the Pass of Drumochter.

After Perth the train had a good turnover of passengers before continuing south but with a 50mph emergency speed restriction due to the high winds meaning by the time it reached Stirling the train was 20 or so minutes late and it got later by the time it reached Edinburgh due to following a Stirling – Edinburgh stopper after Polmont.  As expected, the train did have another good turnover of passengers and departed rather busy, didn’t help that the seat reservation system was broken with the resulting chaos of passengers arguing over reservations.  Annoyingly the train didn’t loss anymore time on the run towards Newcastle arriving around 27 minutes late so not qualifying for delay repay.  I was glad to get off the train at Newcastle for some fresh air as there was someone who boarded at Edinburgh which smelt like they had had a bath of perfume.

800111 at Inverness Station

With light being a premium, I quickly purchased a couple of Metro Day passes (although only 10p less than the day pass allowing use of buses & trains towards Blaydon so getting a bit like Merseyside with the Merseyrail Day Ranger vs Saveaway difference).  It was onto a Whitby bound pair of 156s (156481 & 156471) for the slow run to Sunderland (got caught up behind a late running Metro service so was a bit stop-start).  Where the building at the top of the station is all shiny & new the platform level is still very much a dump featuring some youngsters who were playing with a wet floor sign trying to knock a CCTV camera.

Anyhow it was a short wait at Sunderland before 4014/4048 rolled in to take us back towards Newcastle, featuring the usual Tyne & Wear Metro antisocial behaviour youths messing around on the train (the front half of the first set was very much a no-go area).  At Newcastle we headed out of the station, to locate the Easy Hotel, which I didn’t realise was close to the Quayside area with either a steep hill or steep steps to reach.  Anyhow we checked in, located the twin room (proper twin beds always is better than a double bed & fold-up camp bed you get in some hotels).  Very different to what I was expecting from an Easy Hotel, the room was reasonably sized and didn’t have so much orange.  Only downside was the AC kept on ignoring the control to lower the temperature from 24C or even to be turned off.

We headed back out, heading to the Wetherspoons on Newcastle Quayside, for lack of a better idea.  After dinner we did a little walk across the swing bridge over the Tyne walking along the Gateshead bank towards the Millennium Bridge to cross back to the Newcastle side of the river then back towards the hotel via a closed Tesco Express near a court building.  I left mum to relax in the hotel room and headed back out climbing the steep hill to reach Newcastle station to see if any of my remaining trio of Metro units I need for a mile (having already removed a couple which are long term out of use and very unlikely to enter service again).

River Tyne from Newcastle Swing Bridge towards Tyne & Millennium Bridges

Services were being a bit bounced up due to delays, so I jumped onto 4050/4067 to Gateshead before 4036/4066 to Simonside on the South Shields line (to cover the new track layout from the “Metro Flow” works.  4026/4044 returned me to the shared section of the network at Felling doing a couple of pings to Gateshead Stadium to keep on moving during some gaps.  I alighted from 4078/4013 at Gateshead Stadium which just stayed at the station with news that the train in front had broken down at Gateshead itself, so services were being held.  I was considering what to do as sub mile 4082 & 4073 rolled in on a southbound service which took me to Heworth to push it over a mile and to give me an escape route by using Northern.

There was no movement with the metro other than the occasional departure north with trains heading back south either empty or starting from Gateshead Stadium, so it was onto 158851 & 158817 on a Northern service for Newcastle, a station a bit in chaos due to issues on the line towards Edinburgh caused by the high winds (lots of “Cancelled” showing on the departure screens).  I had a gentle walk back down the hill to reach the Easy Hotel to relax for the remaining of the evening.  I got one more Metro set over a mile; another was out and about which I saw earlier in the day.  The bed was quite comfy as I slept well.

Tyne & Wear Metro Set 4052 at Heworth

22nd January – Saltburn & home

Originally my plan for this Monday was a day on the Metro, maybe also fitting in the Shields ferry but when out on the Sunday I came up with an alternative plan, as the Metro could wait for another day when it wasn’t so windy.  Anyhow we headed to the Spoons again for breakfast, before returning to the hotel to pick up our bags and checking out before making our way to a bus stop located near the guildhall for a Go North East route 54 bus towards Newcastle Central station (with 8807 an Yutong E10 "Voltra") on this loop service.

At Newcastle station it was a short walk to platform 1 to board 156451 on the next Middlesbrough semi-fast service, a recent addition to the timetable calling only at Sunderland & Thornaby so a bit faster than the stopper.  After Sunderland it was carrying around 20 passengers spread across the train so not the busiest train and it felt strange not calling at Hartlepool to see the works continuing for the rebuilt platform (which will allow these semi-fast services to sadly call at Hartlepool as it passed a northbound stopper within the station).  We remained on board to Middlesbrough, turning down a late running 156 for Saltburn for the next TPE with a late running 185138 & 185101 to Saltburn, always sad passing the remains of Redcar works with a lot of the steel works related buildings gone, but hopefully the future remains bright, and the area gets something new built.

At Saltburn, it was very windy as we remained near the station, but for me allowed the coverage of Redcar – Saltburn on TPE.  Up next was a Darlington service with 158861, looking very much out of place alongside the 185s at Saltburn, considering 5 or so years ago Saltburn would have been mostly 142s with the occasional 156 thrown in.  We took this 158 all the way to Darlington passing some works around the mothballed Tees-side airport station (looked like the old turning circle outside the station had been dug up).

158861 alongside a 185 at Saltburn Station

The final leg of our little round trip was onto a late running 801211 bound for Edinburgh which we took back to Newcastle where we had a short wait before boarding 801223 for the run to London, calling only at Darlington & York.  Felt nice to get some decent speed on the ECML but as it was out of path it kept on losing time, eventually reaching Kings Cross 30-odd minutes late (enough to get some cash back from LNER).  At Kings Cross it was a short walk to bus stop L on Kings Cross Road to board Abellio London 3405 (a BYD Enviro400EV) on a route 63 which got quite busy on the run towards the southern entrance of Blackfriars station where we had a gentle walk along the River Thames towards Waterloo Bridge.

We came away from the river near Festival Hall, swinging towards Tesco outside Waterloo station to grab dinner before I checked RTT to see that the 19:20 Waterloo - Exeter was starting from Basingstoke due to the inbound running 45-odd minutes late (and hence terminated at Basingstoke).  So, it was an unexpected trip to Basingstoke on the 19:05 Weymouth train with 444014 & (a rough riding) 444040.  A short wait at Basingstoke as a pair of 450s arrived and departed on the Portsmouth service before 159002, 159012 & 158887 rolled in from the sidings to take us to Grateley, the end of a short break.  Thankfully it wasn't raining for the walk home after this quiet service (I dread to think what the 19:50 Salisbury train would have looked like).  An enjoyable little trip away to the Highlands with a day in the Northeast.

River Thames on South Bank between Blackfriars & Waterloo

Thanks for reading 😃🙂