Severn Valley Railway 2005



'Severn Valley Autumn Steam Gala'
23rd & 24th September 2005

To mark the 40th Anniversary of preserving the Railway this years Autumn Steam Gala featured an impressive line up of no less than eleven Great Western locomotives, including; Modified Hall; 7903 ‘Foremarke Hall’, 7802 ‘Bradley Manor’, 14XX; 1450 (with auto coach 178), Large Prairie; 5164, Mogal 9351, 56XX; 6619, Pannier tanks; 1369, 9466, 1501, 5764 and 7714.
Also in steam were two non-GW designs. LMS Stannier mogal 42968, and SR West Country Class 34027 ‘Taw Valley’, masquerading as 34036 ‘Westward Ho’. After a gloomy start on Friday the weather gradually improved. The sweet spot for me though was the couple of hours Ben and I spent at Eardington station early on Saturday morning, where we were treated to some spectacular displays by the crewmen of 7903 ‘Foremarke Hall’, 7802 ‘Bradley Manor’ and the little 0-4-2 autotrain all working hard up the gradient though the Station.








'Severn Valley in Bloom'
30th July 2005
Expecting the weather by the end of July to be a reasonably settled. I booked accommodation with the view of visiting the Severn Valley Railway for their “Severn Valley in Bloom” event. I have to say that the floral displays at each and every station along the route were beautiful, and a real credit to the hard working volunteers who put in so much time and effort to put on such a spectacular show of colour. Its a shame the weather didn’t bloom too, the morning drizzle and poor light throughout the day compromised any decent pictures, but I’ve managed to salvage a few to record my visit.









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