Blindtraveler
Established Member
Given the age of the van perhaps you should sell it quickly and buy a new one? Lower fuel bills, more up to date facilities and the next poor owning bugger gets a ticket for speeding?
Given the age of the van perhaps you should sell it quickly and buy a new one? Lower fuel bills, more up to date facilities and the next poor owning bugger gets a ticket for speeding?
I did consider it.
It would make a perfect mobile disco van and it even has facing seats in the back with a table and sliding bits in the windows like a Mk 1.
Cheap to you...
I'll give you a fiver for it
Loved your trip report there Cowley. As you know I am going to Croatia in a couple of weeks. I have also spent some time around Lake Garda which as you know is stunning. A mate of mine is the vocalist in a Death Metal band called Carcass and his girlfriend is from Austria. I made the mistake of telling her in the pub that my favourite motorway in the world is in Austria, it is the Brenner Pass, she looked at me like I was mad, how can you have a favourite motorway? Ha ha. I love Lake Garda, especially the way the north end is so different from the south.
If I may be allowed a few more reminiscences?.... A recent visit to the National Railway Museum in York has allowed me to find and photograph the Oerlikon which is my Forum name. Why Oerlikon? Well, it all dates back to school days when a group of us as young lads used to share the costs of riding the North London Line from Broad Street round to Willesden Junction and Richmond. School seemed to take up the whole week; we even had to go to school on Saturdays! So we only had Sundays left to play. Living handy to the Chingford Line in Essex we would hot foot it up to Liverpool Street Station in London and then climb the steps to Broad Street Station which was next door
Broad Street Station was huge, and on Sundays, totally deserted. It had a vast and lofty overall roof with lots of glass missing because of bomb damage in World War 2. Over in the distance at one of the many platforms was an ancient electric train. The Oerlikon! All the other platforms were empty although on other days they hosted ghostly steam trains which somehow gained access to the Great Northern main line and places like Hatfield and Potters Bar. Anyway, we leapt on board the Oerlikon and without any kind of preamble it rumbled out of the station and up onto the rooftops of London on the first stage of a journey which would take us over all the main lines going north out of the City. Through the dim recesses of bomb damaged Dalston Junction with connecting lines disappearing in all directions to who knew where, over the smoke-filled Copenhagen Tunnels just outside Kings Cross, and then immediately over the Camden Road Tunnels just outside St Pancras, mingling with the lines out of Euston, separating at Willesden Junction in the midst of an impossible tangle of railway lines which, by rights, should have allowed access to any part of the known world. Instead, prosaically, we went to Acton after a brief dash across the main lines out of Paddington, then by Kew Bridge over the Thames, past Kew Gardens ending triumphantly at the wonderful riverside town of Richmond.
The Oerlikon in the National Railway Museum is in an elegant crimson livery with gold lining as operated by the LMS Railway and built circa 1914 with electrical equipment supplied by the Oerlikon company. In their heyday, these units penetrated all parts of North London, but when I came to know them they had acquired a standard BR multiple-unit green livery with the lion and wheel emblem and were confined to the Richmond route from Broad Street with occasional forays to Watford. Their huge attraction for us was the four large passenger-operated sliding doors which we could open en-route and enjoy healthy outdoors travel in those far-off summer days. Can you imagine that these days? If it rained and we couldn't enjoy the summer breezes of North London, we would open the doors wide so they slammed to with an enormous crash as the train braked sharply at each station. As I said, there were not many other passengers but those who did inadvertently share the carriage with us would occasionally threaten to throw us out on to the lineside if the doors slammed again. Discretion suggested holding back until they got off!
Can't do any of this now, of course, and quite right too! Health and Safety has moved on since we did those all those crazy things and anyway, there are no steam train numbers to catch as we did hanging precariously out of the doors on the viaducts outside Kings Cross and St Pancras. Even the carriage numbers seemed worthwhile collecting in those days. And in the evenings when it got dark you could blow your mind totally by leaning out and watching the flashes from the conductor shoes as they rode the pointwork with the roll and pitch of the carriages and the slamming of the doors
You can still capture a little of this today. Although Broad Street is long gone, sacrificed to the London property boom, the Overground has been reinstated on the long viaduct leading to Dalston Junction and still crosses high above all the lines northwards out of London, over the Thames at Kew and down to Richmond. It's still a wonderful trip but not quite the same as the full-on body-bashing, mind-bending experience of the open doors of the Oerlikon!
Excellent stuff! Many thanks for posting this and please keep them coming, it's quite obvious where 'young' Mr Cowley gets his writing skills from
I hadn't heard this story before and I must say what an atmospheric picture it conjures up in the mind. The thought of children being able to open a door on a moving train, the mind boggles!
It must have been fascinating to see the city as it was back then, even since I've been going there, originally to visit Granny Cowley, mother of Oerlikon (he was much more scared of her than I was) it's changed so much. Places like St Pancras and Marylebone were dirty and neglected, a stark contrast compared to today.
I loved reading this, hope there's more.
I wasn't more scared of her that you were! At least I didn't get caught with bits of old railway carriage and a huge half eaten bar of chocolate hidden under the bed!
The bits of Railway carriage and half eaten chocolate bar, was probably just last week Mr Oerlikon.:roll:
As my Dad says, don't push it son, your never too old to get a clip.
Haha thanks guys. Erm, Rod Stewart may be slightly cooler. Look they made me go ok!
Oh come on Mr Cowley just come clean and admit it
Btw I had you down as more of an Adge Cutler & The Wurzels nut bearing in mind your geographical location
Oh come on Mr Cowley just come clean and admit it
Shang-a-lang.
ha ha very catchy, where's the next gig....One Direction?
I don't know what you'd get if you crossed The Wurzels with The Bay City Rollers? Probably a torn space time continuum or something similar...
Could've been worse Cowley, could've been Shakey or Showaddywaddy
I bet your ringtone is Bony M's Painter Man!