Culture Club

When Leander drowned in a storm whilst swimming across the Dardanelles on his way to meet his lover, Hero, it was obviously not a great night to be out of the house. Jubilee Class No 45690 Leander it was, then, that lead us up into the hills, double-heading with Black Five No. 45407, through intermittently blizzard conditions on Saturday’s High Peak Explorer. Nothing, if not intrepid, that Leander.

With over four hours to kill at Buxton in sub-zero conditions, we were drawn to continue our cultural theme by the banner advertising a coffee morning at the Opera House, built by the renowned opera house architect, Frank Matcham, in 1903.

Half way through our Bakewell tarts we were offered a guided tour by one of the coffee morning volunteers. In the ladies’ loo there is a dumbwaiter, by which means the ladies - who were not allowed to join their husbands at the men only bar - acquired their drinks. The thought of all those women, dressed to the nines and intent on a good night out, in reality being corralled into the ladies’ loo during the intermission, with only some fine copper-work piping and a series of substantial circular wooden seats to admire, is quite something.

We braved the next flurry of snow to take lunch at the Pavilion Gardens next door. Entering through a magnificent conservatory, containing an equally impressive floral display and to the accompaniment of a french horn soloist, we made our way up to the first-floor Art Café, which was running true to form with a display of the work of local artists adorning the walls.

Designed by Sir Joseph Paxton and opened in 1871, it was the arrival of the railway to Buxton during the previous decade that had encouraged further development of the spa town. We spent the following three hours there over lunch as the weather raged outside, occasionally clearing for short-lived bursts of sunshine.

When Leander and his partner for the day arrived back at the station to continue our exploration of the freight-only lines that surround the town, we were back to near blizzard conditions. I sheltered under the canopy while the lads fought the elements to get their snow-flecked photographs. It suddenly dawned on me that I was next to the ladies’ loo again. I decided that I should probably drop that habit with immediate effect.

It was a good job that we had the fearless Leander and the ever-dependable Black Five at the fore to get us through the worst that the “mini-beast from the east” could muster. So, what’s next for the culture club? Well, a brief incursion through the ramparts of Conwy Castle into Owain Glyndwr territory on the North Wales Coast Express is a possibility, or maybe a literary diversion on the Shakespeare Express to Stratford? – both weather permitting, of course.