It sounds unlikely, perhaps, but I did. I only went there
once - on my own [I think] on 4/8/62. I had missed a visit to Stafford Road
works and sheds that my friends had made a short time before, and I wanted to
“catch up” on some of the stuff they had seen. I had no permits, so I spent a
few hours on Low Level station and then came home, travelling both ways on the
through trains between Birkenhead and London Paddington, via Shrewsbury and
Chester.
These trains reversed at Chester, but certainly did not
always leave from the bay platforms closest to the entrance that were used for
most GW line destinations. The Western diesel is shown leaving for Paddington
from the main down platform in September 1962, whereas the 2-6-4 tank has
brought a Paddington special train into the bay in 1967, after regular services
on the route had finished. Sometimes the through platform on the far side of
the station had been preferred for these services.
It was certainly a productive day out. I saw 3 Counties, 12
Castles, 5 Kings [cabbing 6014], 1 Manor, 3 Granges and 17 Halls. The writing
was already on the wall, however, as 3 Western diesels also put in an
appearance and within a few months all the Kings had gone. Dream on, I say.
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