I was around 11 and I'd been badgering my dad to take me somewhere during the 6 weeks holidays, he'd taken me to the NRM one weekend a few months previous with a couple of my cousins and I was eager to get there again or go to Edinburgh, for a day out looking at trains, Dad said, he'd do his best and try and get some time off work and to leave it with him.
One afternoon, my dad shouted me in the house and said, I've got some news for you about going trainspotting but you need to ask a friend too, I was talking to Alan last night in the club and he wants to know, if you and a friend would like to go to Crewe with him and a few of his mates, I gleefullly said yes, then said, where's Crewe and are you coming too, he said no and its 4 weeks time, your going through the night, to Carlisle and down the West Coast, Carlisle, I said, its supposed to be brilliant there and overnight. Excitement wasn't the word.
If you want go you'll have to save your pocket money for your spending money, I had to choose a friend to go, there was only one place, so my 2 cousins were ruled out, there was only one option, my Tyne Yard companion, I nearly took his door off the hinges knocking to ask if he wanted to go. My Dad was told to go and explain to my friends mam and dad and it was on.
Skip forward 4 weeks any bit of pocket money, spare change and odd job money earned at grandparents house went into a big jar in the kitchen. Alll changed to notes on the day at the post office and my grandparents added an extra tenner to the fund. At 4 o'clock and like cats on a hot tin roof, my Dad, obviously sick of us being totally hyper told me and my mate to make ourselves scarce for a bit but be back in time for a bath and a change of clothes, we bunked off to Tyne Yard, stopped at the paper shop for new notebooks and enough pens to sink a ship
and on the 10 minute walk to Tyne Yard, we spoke of seeing our first Electrics, we looked in our battered locosheds, hoping to see the likes of Royal Scot, City of Lancaster etc.
We took the last DMU off Newcastle - Carlisle, it was then, my mate and I found out that we'd been invited because that we took notice but more importantly were needed for the railcards, Alan and his friends were brilliant with my mate and I, explaining what was planned and where we were going, a visit to the works planned on Saturday afternoon, then off to Chester, jump on the merseyrail to a depot called Allerton, then back home on the Liverpool to Newcastle.
At Carlisle the very first loco we saw is etched in my mind it was 37003, a Gateshead stalwart, we'd seen it at Tyne Yard in the afternoon, we had an hour or so at Carlisle to kill, our eyes darted everywhere, our first electrics were a pair of 86's on a freightliner, an 08 was shunting mail vans, my mate and I went over an asked if we could cab it, the shunter driver an old guy, said hop aboard and asked what we were doing out of bed at this hour, we explained to him it was our 1st time in Carlisle and we were going to Crewe, I don't know if it was oiur excitement or our story but credit to that old fella, we got our 1st cab ride in that 08, one of Alans mates took a photo of me and my mate looking out the window of the 08 in the middle road of Carlisle Station, if we'd went home there and then, I'd have been a happy bunny. Our first electric hauled train wasn't an 86 or 87 but 81013 to Preston, Alan pointed out the angle of the coaches as we went over Shap. At Preston, the Police asked us all what we were up to on the station and asked to look at the tickets, probably baffled why a motley collection of Geordies would be standing in Preston at god knows what hour, all the time, more electric hauled freight trains whizzed through, we couldn't(my mate and I) comprehend why they all were double headed but certainly weren't complaining, from Preston to Wigan we jumped aboard hauled by 85022, then after a short stay there it was another 81, this time 81004 to Warrington, I was looking forward to an 86 or 87 for haulage but was told by Alan, these are rarer, there'll be plenty time to be hauled by the 86/87's, I wasn't convinced. after a good hour and a half if not more at Warrington, which was an amazing for freight of all types both Electric and Diesel, it seemed everything we'd saw was a cop, truly fantastic. The next electric for haulage to Crewe was 86240, at last we'd got one.
Crewe was chocker block, we spent ages picking off loco's on Crewe Diesel and around the platforms, picking off the units and other passenger turns, both electric and diesel, my mate and I were on over 2 hours writing stuff down, evetually with our feet killing, we sat down on one of them parcel barrows taking stock of what we'd seen so far, this was trainspotting as good as it gets. We took a wander to the Station shop and bought a copy of Rail Entusiast and as I was walking away I saw a spotters book and seen as we'd saved up for this and our locosheds were battered to bits, we decided to purchase the brand new Platform 5 loco, DMU and EMU books and all with new blue plastic covers to boot, my mate bought one of them labelling guns too and we labelled our books, so we knew which one was which, we were as happy as pigs in the proverbial
. I didnt want to leave the station but with the works visit planned, we did and the wether it was the excitement or not, the walk to the works seemed to take ages.
The works was nothing like what I expected, but in a good way, definitely more interesting, than just getting the numbers. They were building the last 3new 56's then too, the numbers were chalked on the shells, seeing them repairing crash damaged loco's, can't remember if it was that visit or the open day years later, when I saw 47452 there, 47452 had crashed on Morpeth curve and my mates and I saw it being moved by another 47, passing Tyne Yard, 47452 was half covered in a tarpaulin, there was no tarp on it, when I saw it next at Crewe Works and we got to see the full extent of the damage to it, I asked then, will 47452 get fixed or withdrawn and was told it looks worse than it really is and it should get to run again, it was great news for this 47 fanatic, then there was more electrics to pick off with binoculars off Crewe Electric.
Back to Crewe for the next move, this time to Chester, I have always been a 47 fanatic, so when a Peak took the place of the electric for the journey to Holyhead, again I was disappointed only to be told again, you know how often peaks do this run, I didnt really want to know but the journey was a laugh, with one of Alan's mates telling me how he used to drive Claytons for the NCB. A jump on the merseyrail and off to Allerton, I've never seen so many shunters in one Depot, mainly 08's but I'm sure the was an 03 and a couple of 37's too. Back on the Merseyrail to Lime Street, then it was a short hop on a DMU, I think one of lads wanted it for haulage but we did pass Edge Hill for and picked off the shunter there, then from Manchester to Newcastle it was 47422 home, I had my head out the front window next to the loco as we left but I decided to take a seat and promptly flaked out, till about Leeds, we all tried to pick off as much as we could at Neville Hill and York but I was shattered but had the biggest grin ever, we got off at Newcastle and got the numbers of whatever was knocking about jumped in a taxi, got home and bored my dad to death before i was sent for a bath then bed after my supper. I waited till the next day to mark everything up in my new books an arduous task a one I still hate doing.