This is probably one of the most crazy weekends we had ever considered.

Over this weekend on August there were two excellent railtours operating on both the Saturday and the Sunday. This is not ideal situation that the tours are on consecutive days but is normally possible and not a problem as you could travel between most parts of the UK. The major difficulty was that both railtours were in the UK but the Saturday one was in Northern Ireland and the second in Scotland.

The Saturday tour was the ITG’s Mini MV railtour and the Sunday tour was Scotrail’s start of Farewell to Class 26 tours between Edinburgh and Oban.

We were not even sure if this was going to be possible to get between the two tours. Some extensive research was going to have to take place. The travel options offered by the ITG were just not going to work. Even driving through the night between Holyhead and Edinburgh we would not be able to make it. This needed a little further thought and the Stena Line ferries between Stranraer and Larne just didn’t work. SeaCat Scotland services between Stranraer and Belfast had just started operating and this potentially could work as the timings were around the right time of day and the faster crossing times made it possible. This would also be out first trip on a high speed service across the Irish Sea with a crossing time of 90 minutes.

We would also have to stay overnight in Scotland between the tours. This was long before Travelodge and Premier Inn arrived on the scene. The Internet was also in it’s infancy and commercial organisations were yet to discover it. One of our group then came up with a great idea. Glasgow University halls of residence rent out rooms during the summer holidays and this was in the middle of August so should be available. This was also turning into a popular trip with a total of 8 of us travelling therefore requiring two cars.

It looks as though we have a plan, leave home at 2 a.m. and drive to Stranraer and catch the first SeaCat from Stranrear to Belfast and do the ITG tour. Catch the last SeaCat back to Stranraer and drive to Glasgow. Overnight in the halls of residence and up in time for the Class 26 tour to Oban and back. Then drive home and arrive home about midnight on Sunday. This was going to be complex to pull together and has the potential to go spectacularly wrong. We managed to procure all the railtour and SeaCat tickets, hotel rooms (£10 each for a single room) and nominated our drivers of which I was one.

Saturday 22 August 1992

The weather was unbelievably bad for August. We had expected warm and sunny but it was very windy and very heavy rain. I grabbed a few hours sleep before setting off and picking up my passengers and meeting up with the other car. The drive north was awful the car was being blown about with very heavy rain all the way. We expected to arrive around 5 a.m. but it was actually nearer 6 a.m. We had allowed plenty of time so were OK for the ferry. I was running short on petrol but nothing was open at this time in the morning so we will have to resolve this problem this evening.

We had been considering another problem. Would the SeaCat sail in this weather? We went to the ferry terminal to discover that the sailing would be going as booked but would operate at reduced speed because of the sea conditions. The SeaCat did operate and sailing can be described as very lively. You could hardly stand up as it bounced across the Irish Sea. We quickly discovered that high speed sea craft are much less stable in the sea than conventional ferries. I think if that had been 2010 this sailing would not have operated. We examined the breakfast options and the hot sausage and bacon croissant was the best option. Cereal would have been sprayed around all over the place.

In arrival in Belfast Donegal Quay and a bus is on hand to take us to Central Station where we had time to kill before the arrival of the tour. We decided to go down to Portadown and catch the loco hauled from Dublin back into Belfast. We knew this was going to work as this was an advertised connection by the ITG and the train is bringing the carriages for the tour.

105 at Antrim for the second time.

The Mini MV is probably one of the most select tours I have ever been on. The train was formed of 2 Irish Rail cravens coaches and a steam generator van. The former  CIE “C” Class operated by NIR virtually never worked any passenger trains as they were vacuum braked and all the coaching stock in Northern Ireland are air braked. This is why Irish Rail Cravens coaches had to be used. This tour had a total of 5 reversals and photo stops during the day.  Full details of the tour can be found at the www.irishtractiongroup.com website.

In the evening we again have some time to kill before the ferry so we go for a trip to Bangor and back.

After we got back we still had plenty of time before the ferry so decided to walk from Central station to Donegal Quay. This is the first time we had visited Belfast city. We had visited the station many times but had never been outside. We walked outside the station to see two police armoured personnel carriers go flying down the road. This is not a sight we were not used to seeing in the UK and not what you expect. It was very off putting.

We are a group of 8 men to be walking round Belfast together. At least we had safety in numbers but more likely to be stopped by the security forces. We were lucky the walk to Donegal Quay went without incident. The ferry departed a little late because of the high winds in the Irish Sea. The journey back was very similar to the outward and very rough and lost further time.

We arrived back in Stranraer at 23:00 and have a drive to Glasgow ahead of us. We had yet to solve the problem from the morning of trying to find fuel. We drive round Stranraer to find everything is closed. Nothing was open. In the end we have to try and make it to Glasgow with the fuel we have. Fortunately right on the end of town there was a 24 hour petrol station. Problem solved.

The drive to Glasgow was horrific. The road between Stranraer and Ayr hugs the coast and is very twisty. The weather had got far worse than the previous evening and you could hardly see where you were going with the very very heavy rain high winds and dense mist. There were no lights on the road and the second car could not see the one in front. We had to take it very easy and as a consequence of this we do not arrive in Glasgow until after 2 a.m. We had now been up for 24 hours.

The next problem was that we could not find anywhere to park near the halls of residence. We eventually find somewhere to park and find our ways into the halls of residence. The get to our rooms at 3 a.m. Time for bed we are exhausted.

Sunday 23 August 1992

We had agreed the previous evening to get up at 08:00 and meet at 08:30 for breakfast. We then head back to find the cars and make our way to Queen St station. We end up getting lost as we have had to park on a one way street pointing away from the road that heads into town. I takes us a little time to work our way back.

26007+26001 after running round in Oban.

This tour is unusual as it is booked to use the low level platforms at Queen St. The use of these platforms by loco hauled trains was very rare. This tour is also a repeat of the one ran by ScotRail 6 weeks earlier, which we had also travelled on. The tour arrives and we are surprised to find 26007 (D5300) and 26001 (D5301) have been repainted in original green livery with small yellow warning panels.

The line to Oban is one of my favourites and best enjoyed on a loco hauled train as it features some steep inclines in both directions. Class 26 locos were not regular performers on this route but enjoyable all the same. The tour had slight problems as the multiple working was not working correctly otherwise the tour ran as booked.

We arrived back in Glasgow and it was now a 200 mile drive home.

This was a very complex and crazy plan but it had worked very well. This was amazing as there were so many possible things that could go wrong. We were exhausted but would have done this again if we had the choice.

Traction Log: