North Norfolk Railway

The North Norfolk Railway is a 5-mile long "steam heritage railway" located between the villages of Sheringham and Holt with a mid-point station at Weybourne.  Two miles beyond the upper station at Holt is the small village of Letheringsett where the Moore family came from.  The railway was once part of the Midland & Great Northern Joint Railway (a rare beast in British railway organization) but with the "rationalization" of the British Railway system in the late 1950`s, the first part of the M&GN was closed in 1959.

A number of railway enthusiasts formed the Midland & Great Northern Joint Railway Preservation Society in October 1959, just a few weeks after most of the M&GN network had closed. However, the section that is now the North Norfolk Railway survived the initial closure, but was finally chopped by the infamous Beeching axe in April of 1964.

At first the Society focused on trying to re-open other parts of the M&GN line but ultimately had success in 1973 with the opening of the line between Sheringham and Weybourne when they were granted a light railway order.  Efforts continued to expand the line between Weybourne and Holt but faced the challenge of having to relay track up a 1-in-80 grade.  While it was impossible to reach the town of Holt as the right-of-way now had a highway on it, the line was relaid by Society volunteers along the original trackbed to a point about a mile from Holt town and saw its first train on March 19, 1989.  The story of the development of the North Norfolk is a most interesting one which has become a major tourist attraction in the northern part of Norfolk. The line covers a very scenic 5.25 miles (10.5 mile round trip) between Sheringham and Holt station with a view of the shores of the North Sea.

As the weeks go by, we`ll bring you up to speed on the North Norfolk Railway.

Why Am I Blogging!!!???

What the heck am I doing here!!?? Me in a blog!! What's going on!?

Well, let me tell you. I'm getting ready to go to England for 6 weeks between May 11th and June 22nd.  Whenever I've travelled, particularly overseas, I've kept a daily diary of what we did, where we went, what we saw, and who we met in one of those daily diary books that the managers always carry with them whenever they went to meetings. I always had a problem with writing in these kind of diary books.  I was very faithful in keeping my diary up to date for the first couple of weeks.  But for the last couple of weeks, I wouldn't write a thing. It was always a mad scramble when I got home to update the diary, although the ticket stubs and brochures of the places we visited helped to jog my memory - if I ever did update my diary when I got home.

Then in the last two weeks of our 2008 summer visit to England, I got in the habit of doing an e-mail almost every day, or at least every second day, to family and friends.  When I got back home, all I had to do was copy and paste these e-mails into a document, do a bit of editing, and, voila, I had my diary. I was better at typing e-mails (my typing speed is about 40 wpm) than I was at writing longhand in a book (I always lose my train of thought when I write - which is why I prefer to type).

So, why not continue with the e-mails?  Firstly, I discovered blogs last fall with the Ottawa Blogspot.  I bookmarked the blog and it is now part of my regular daily news reading. You can upload photos, videos, edit what you are saying, keep track of what you previously said, and allow people to comment on your news - which you can't do with e-mail. Once you hit the "Send" button, it's gone - no turning back.  There's also the bit of "show-off" to a certain extent where I'm trying to stay on top of this computer technology.  For me, the computer, the Internet, websites, and the whole ball of wax has opened up a new dimension in communication. (So much for this rant, eh.)

And besides, this will be my own on-line daily diary of what I will be doing during my stay in England. Words, videos, photos, and all.

Bob M.