Cycling the Southwell Trail

How lucky we are to have the trail. I use it most frequently to complete my regular cycling circuit, usually joining it at Maythorne. Its uphill nearly all the way home to Farnsfield, but as that’s the railway version of uphill, I can cope quite easily with the gradients, in spite of frequent westerly winds and the occasional squelchy surface after heavy rain, which makes it more difficult for the tyres to grip.

The Southwell Trail hasn’t been a railway line since the mid-1960s. Before that, it carried passengers from 1871 to 1929 and after that mostly coal, especially once the link with Bilsthorpe colliery had been established in the 1930s, via the junction at Farnsfield. The stations at Farnsfield, Kirklington and Edingley and Southwell all had goods yards with sidings and were served by occasional pick-up freight trains, bringing in coal, machinery and building materials, and taking out largely agricultural produce.

The three station buildings all remain today as private dwellings. Also surviving are the former platform edges at Farnsfield and at Kirklington and Edingley. Farnsfield goods shed - also now a residence, the former track bed with its cuttings and embankments, the original road bridges and culverted stream crossings, a splendid little Midland Railway plate layers’ hut, or perhaps more likely a small goods office, at what was the entrance to the former station yard at Kirklington and Edingley, as well as a concrete framed, metal loading gauge at the other end of the same site, originally placed there to make sure that open wagons were not overloaded when they left the goods yard by rail. The former goods yard is now a picnic area. The signalbox at Farnsfield was removed after the line closed and the location today is just a tangle of undergrowth, though the car park area and the spacious entrance to the trail at this point remind us that there were a number of sidings on both sides of the line near the station, which also had a passing loop and two platforms on an otherwise single-track railway.

The trail is now a multi-use path, catering for ramblers, runners, cyclists, dog walkers, birdwatchers, horse riders, nature lovers and geocachers. Normal progress has also, on at least one occasion, been interrupted by the hunt - all dressed up, tally-ho, hunting horns and galloping. Presumably they were chasing a lure, as they are supposed to do these days, but that was no consolation for the two brown hares that got caught up in it all. They were chased off the fields and sought refuge in a hedgerow alongside the trail, only to be promptly torn to bits by the pack. That spectacle unfolded within full view of an unsuspecting young couple who, up to that point, had been out for a nice quiet walk in the countryside. The moment was within our earshot, as well, unfortunately. I imagine that hares are what the hunters might describe as collateral damage. Nottingham-based hunt saboteurs were also present but appeared to be having little effect on proceedings. As they were necessarily on foot, rather than in their cars, they were struggling to keep up with all the action, so hardly an equal race, really, which had obviously already been won, anyway, by the hounds.

One major reason that I wend my way home along the trail rather than by road, is the wildlife. Over the years I’ve seen mouse, shrew, stoat, bats, fox and loads of grey squirrels, of course, and all quite close up. There was a very recognisable badger sett that had been quarried into the embankment near Edingley until its more recent collapse. The well-worn paths either side of the trail between the foliage at that point suggested a substantial badger community, though I never witnessed any all-night parties of intensive badgering, myself. In the early days, there were also sand lizards at the Farnsfield end, close to the entrance and the houses, where there was a sand bunker lined with wooden sleepers that was presumably another left-over from the railway age. Railwaymen sometimes put sand on the tracks to improve adhesion.  

Birds are plentiful, with fieldfare and redwing flocks in winter, as well as linnet, goldcrest, bullfinch, brambling, buzzard and lesser redpoll. Summer visitors include common and lesser whitethroat, garden warbler, willow warbler [though fewer than previously], sedge warbler [heard this morning next to where the formation crosses Halam Beck, where I once also saw a snipe] and legions of blackcap. Green woodpeckers are commonly heard, red kites are increasing but still only occasional, and skylarks are quickly off the mark in each new year, sometimes deciding that it is spring a bit prematurely, it seems to me, at a time when I am still deliberating between four layers of protection from the elements and three. I don’t see tree sparrow these days, yellowhammer are less frequent, too, and I haven’t heard corn bunting locally for years. I miss the once common cuckoos in the vicinity of Edingley, where the station also used to get regular nesting turtle doves, at one time. One fairly regular attraction when cycling the trail is sparrowhawk. They always see me coming before I see them. Then they fly off away from me along the path, below the tree canopy and close to the ground, before veering off and finding another perch to the side of the trail. They may repeat this action three or four times, as I move steadily towards them, before they get fed up with me and head off somewhere else.     

Most folk I pass are quite friendly. I have a tinkly little bell to announce my presence, especially for those who are going my way and therefore haven’t seen me coming. People are often on their phones, listening to podcasts or deep in conversation with each other, and so not everyone acknowledges me. If I’m still unsure whether they know that I’m there or not, I just give them as wide a berth as possible.  

In my experience, people generally look after their dogs much better, these days, and so the dogs behave better, as a result. If I ding my bell to attract their attention as I approach, most folk will either reel in their long dog leads, reach for the dog’s collar or go for a tasty doggy treat from their coat pocket as a distraction, so that their charges forget about trying to take a piece out of my ankle, as I come by. I always thank them and wish them good day.

Then there are insects. We seem to be very well off for insects in Nottinghamshire. In the summer months, most of them seem to want to visit our house. If we leave the door open, which I’m prone to do when its warmer, we soon attract house flies, may flies, crane flies, wasps and bees, all coming in for a look round. Most of them then spend a lot of time and energy unsuccessfully trying to find their way out again. On my bike, I wear a snood over my head and beneath my helmet at all times, to protect from the sun and from flying wildlife. Every now and then, buzzing insects get wedged between the grills in my headgear and I then panic, rip off my helmet and throw it to the floor, only to find that there is still a loud buzzing in my ear as the culprit is sitting somewhere on my snood, so I start madly whacking myself about the head until I manage to dislodge it.

It’s no wonder, then, that the trail attracts all those insect-eating birds in summer. Mosquitos, midges, ladybirds, flying ants, thunder flies, the horse flies that congregate on dollops of horse poo, and those exceedingly juicy-looking, slow moving, very black and much larger than average jobs with dangly legs - the ones that look like there’re probably the most nutritious, though I’m not intent on giving them a try, all make it essential for me to keep my mouth shut as much as possible as I saunter along between May and September. Even then, smaller insects miraculously manage to squeeze themselves between my glasses and my goggles and I’m left desperately pawing at my face to shake them free with one hand whilst grabbing the handlebar more tightly than usual with the other one, as I wobble along.

As is the case in so many other parts of the country, the severe contraction of the railway network in the 1960s provided great opportunities for the development of these amazing social amenities, along what were also to become valuable wildlife corridors. Many local authorities gratefully accepted the challenge, but in our travels around the country, we’ve also seen areas where this hasn’t yet happened as much as it could or should have done, even though the potential is still there for it in many instances, in the form of an increasingly overgrown former track bed.

Our own local trail can also be used to reach Clipstone Forest, via Bilsthorpe, and the River Trent at Fiskerton, by way of the gated racecourse road at Southwell, with only comparatively short stretches of on-road cycling needed to complete the links. Dedicated urban cycle lanes, the ongoing contributions of Sustrans and the creation of a system of linked national cycleways continue to encourage more people to get about by bike. So, thank goodness for the trail at Farnsfield, and a big thank you to the local authority for their foresight, and especially to the Friends of the Southwell Trail for all their hard work in maintaining it so well for us all to use as we see fit. 

The Hull and Hornsea Railway

The Hull and Hornsea Railway was opened in 1864, but was acquired just two years later by the North Eastern Railway. It was intended to bring holiday makers to the budding resort, which was seen as a quieter alternative to Bridlington, further to the north. Early visitors were encouraged to take the local spring water as a potential health benefit. The seaside aspect of Hornsea today is rather under-whelming, and the more stately, Victorian housing in the town centre is much more appealing. The railway went under during the Beeching cuts, losing passenger traffic in 1964 and goods services in the following year.

However, Hornsea Town station still stands. Though derelict after closure, it was converted to attractive housing in 1987 and is now Grade II listed. The old station house is a particularly elegant structure, complete with LNER-style house name above the front door. The old line is now the last [or first] section in the trans-Pennine off-road cycleway from Southport.

The nearest railway to Hornsea today is at Beverley, where we intercepted a late afternoon Scarborough to Hull service, in the form of one of the 7 surviving two-car Class 155 DMUs used by Northern on this route, at a level crossing barrier in the town.

Toton from the bank

Toton from the bank, this morning, with plenty of Class 60, 66 and 67s on view and an additional bonus of the Belmond Pullman heading towards Chesterfield behind 67024.

Rapid Transit

Although we were in America for 10 days, the only train I saw all the time I was there was on the dedicated Dulles airport metro. Running parallel to the airport approach road, the Washington Metro Silver Line provides a direct link with the city centre. Though we travelled from and to the American international airport by car, at Heathrow we took the equivalent rapid transit system from Terminal 5 to London Paddington, which takes a mere 15 minutes to reach central London. The only other stop is the one serving terminals two and three. Once out of the tunnels and onto the GWR main line, the Heathrow Express certainly lives up to its name, whisking its passengers into town in comfortable EMU Class 387 stock with overhead transmission.

Its always a pleasure to arrive at Paddington, a vibrant and attractive station in so many ways, combining the old with the new. One of the original station approaches has had its cladding removed since we were there a year ago to reveal once again the entrance next to the former railway hotel - now the Hilton.

 

   

Annesley

Information display boards vary greatly. Overall, I think that they are much better than they used to be, in terms of design, clarity and durability - open as they often are to the elements. I found this one particularly useful. It takes a “then and now” approach, superimposing more recent developments over the former railway landscape and doing it very effectively.

We had made for Newstead and Annesley Country Park in search of a mealy redpoll that had been well-publicised on the Nottinghamshire Birdwatchers excellent website, but which had apparently left the area a day or two earlier. The feeders that had attracted it for the preceding weeks kept us entertained instead with bullfinch, siskin, reed bunting and lesser redpoll. A few pairs of black necked grebe were also busy on one of the lakes.

I have known about Annesley [16D] for as long as I can remember as an important shed on the old Great Central Railway. It was home to freight engines, in particular, and especially the Standard 9Fs used on mineral traffic in the Midlands. I never reached it, however, so it has remained just a mystical name from the past for me.

At this point, the Leen Valley was eventually host to three parallel, north to south, main line railways – the MR, GNR and GCR. Today, it only has a lone, single-track section of the Nottingham to Worksop, Robin Hood line. In the meantime, most of the railway lines were taken up, the pit waste tips were expanded in their place, then the collieries themselves were closed and a significantly despoiled landscape gradually began to return to nature with the help of the local authorities and a wide range of environmental groups.

For someone who had no way of visualising exactly what it used to be like - what was where and what the sequence of events was - an on-site map with concise explanations what was just what was required. I can’t be sure it will do the trick in this second-hand form, but I’ll give it a go, nevertheless.

Destination Crewe, Recycled

I sat on the plastic chair at the plastic table in the tiny cordoned off café space at the Gourmet Coffee Bar and Kitchen on platform 5 and drank an excellent one-shot Americano from my cardboard cup with its plastic lid. I’d had one on a previous visit and so I knew just where to head to. Ahead of me and at height alongside the footbridge was a rather plasticky looking notice “Destination Crewe HS2”, in BR totem style. It was as flat, faded and worn as the aspiration that put it there in the first place.

Crewe was certainly my destination for a few hours yesterday, however, on a breezy, cool, though largely bright and sunny day. Above the entrance to the original station buffet on platform 6 is the inscription “The Crewe Hero”. Perhaps they mean me, after all I’ve been coming here every now and then for over 60 years. The illustration of a Coronation Class locomotive, a type that used to grace this same platform certainly took me back. Maybe it was one of the rarer Polmadie examples arriving at 3 in the afternoon on the Glasgow to Birmingham express. That was the closest I got to steam yesterday, though a few heritage diesels did put in an appearance. It still draws me back, this place, and the chances of a return before long and another very decent cup of coffee are now significantly higher than the arrival of HS2 - and may even precede the recycling of the plastic sign.

The GCR Celebrates its 125th Anniversary

Last weekend, the GCR was 125 years old. In 1899, the London Extension was opened between Annesley and Quainton Road, thus connecting the old Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway in the north with the Metropolitan Railway in the Home Counties. This allowed expresses to travel directly for the first time from Manchester London Road to the new station at Marylebone, on the then newly renamed Great Central Railway.

The modern-day GCR has now been a heritage railway for longer than in any of its previous guises – GCR, LNER and BR. It is to the great credit of the volunteers who saved it from complete destruction in the late 60s and early 70s, and to those who have followed them since, that there is now a vibrant double track main line to enjoy, complete with its own branch line, and with plans well underway for a through inter-city railway connecting the southern edge of Nottingham with the northern extremities of Leicester.

The celebratory weekend included a get together at Marylebone on Friday and a two-day anniversary event back in Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire to emphasise the increasingly close links being forged between the current GCR at Loughborough and the GCR[N] at Ruddington, joined for the duration by shuttle buses running between the two.