[meurglysIII]

Well, thanks for the pointers everybody, we had a great few days, starting with a gorgeous drive over the Cat & Fiddle pass towards Buxton in beautiful sunshine on Saturday.

Stopped at Peak Rail in Rowsley on Saturday on the way past, saw the two class 50s living there and their large collection of shunters in various states of repair, also a lovely looking freshly-painted LMS red engine in the shed. (sorry, kettles aren't my area but i think it was a Pacific). A great setup they have there.

The restored station at Cromford is really comfortable and beautifully restored. Trains pass about 2 per hour but didn't really bother us, they were one and two car units. It was a bit disconcerting having commuters looking at us but i don't think they could see much through the triple-glazing. The only thing I would say is as there was no way to open the window units, it must get quite warm in there when the weather is hot. Thankfully that's not often...

On Sunday we had a drive to Butterley to the Midland railway. I was very disappointed here, there was nobody in the booking office and information was hard to come by. We didn't take the steam train here as I thought £12 each was a bit much for a short journey. As it was lunchtime we ate in the station "cafe" a portakabin where we had the worst toasties in the world, a thin sliver of processed cheese and a bit of old ham on some thin bread, £4.99 each, served by a young girl who couldn't hold two thoughts in her head at the same time. She forgot we'd asked for tea, though I was sure she'd charged for it....

On Monday we went to the Ecclesbourne Valley railway, at first we walked down the hill from the stone centre to Ravenstor station, then realised this was an unmanned platform with no facilities and there would be no return train that day, so walked back up the hill, got in the car and drove to Wirksworth.
I have to say this was by far the best of the 3 railways we visited, everyone was friendly and chatty, we got the last train of the day to Idridgehay, £6 return, much more reasonable and the guard was funny & chatty.

On Monday evening we went for a walk down the canal at Cromford to see the Sheep Junction workshops, and walked up the incline as far as Black Rocks, by this time it was getting towards dusk so we couldn't go further, plus my calf muscles were hurting.... I feel now like I need to go back and walk the trail downhill from Wirksworth Stone Centre, and maybe in the other direction too.

All in all it was a good weekend packed with heritage train stuff, which my wife admirably tolerated. I think she may be starting to be converted... we went to Derby on the train for her to do a bit of shopping as a reward.......

Apologies if I've been harsh to the volunteers at Midland, feel free to shout up for them if I have offended, but as we all know, first impressions count, and I think they have some work to do.