- The date 27 August 2012-Early (for a bank holday)
- The meeting place Head Street Colchester
- The destination Mid Suffolk Light Railway, Brockford
- The attenders- approximatly 28 CAMRA members from Colchester, Tendering and Sulfolk!!!
- Dress Code casual ( mostly some kind of beer related polo shirt, apart from Mr Keith Graham, who was sporting a rather UN-fashionable but fantastic waistcoat made out various real ale beer mats, with ? silver buttons, and a beautiful green back.
Brief History of the Railway
"The MSLR effectively went broke before it opened but still managed to struggle on for almost 50 years! The 'MIDDY' as it is affectionately known was set up following the Light Railways Act of 1896 which was passed in the great depression as a means to open up parts of the country that had no easy access to markets in the main cities and towns. The act helped railways to be built much more cheaply than the 'heavy railways.' and with less requirements eg. signalling etc. It was to run from Haughley Junction (on the Great Eastern Railway's main London – Norwich line) to Halesworth, on the East Suffolk line from London to Great Yarmouth. A branch was intended from Kenton (about a third of the way from Haughley to Halesworth) to Westerfield but the company was too poor to complete this.
It was September 1904 that the first section of the MSLR opened for goods traffic and during September 1908 it was open for passengers ( a distance of about 19 miles) Short extensions were built beyond Laxfield to Cratfield and Westerfield to a place near Debenham, but these never carried passengers and goods traffic was sparce stopping after a short while. This track was lifted during the Great War .There were ten stations and the main use of the railway was the carriage of agricultural traffic - cattle, sheep, barley, potatoes and Coal.
In 1923 the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) was formed to run the railways on the eastern side of the country and the MSLR was absorbed into this. After WW2, road transport took over and and by the early 1950s the only real passengers were secondary school pupils travelling to stowmarket. In 1951, closure was announced and the final train ran on Saturday 26th July 1952 and the land was sold to farmers and ploughed up.
In 1990, a small group of local railway enthusiasts felt that there ought to be a permanent reminder of the line. A Museum was set up in the village of Wetheringsett, almost on the site of the former Brockford station and is now a well established as a preserved railway and a Suffolk tourist attraction, kept running by volunteers."
from www.mslr.org.uk
Our Trip
About 2 minutes after leaving the house I realised I had left my wasp killer electric tennis racket at home. I turned back, but was restrained, and forced to continue without it. (last years trip must have held the wasp olympics, there were more wasps than I had ever seen in my life!! ( luckily I had no need to worry...not one wasp was at the MSLR this year :) ) We arrived at head st to find quite a crowd of expectant CAMRA people bumberling around in a small area, chattering about this and that. We waited with anticipation for the great green vintage Eastern National bus to arrive. Dave pulled up and we all bundled on. On the way the weather turned from beautiful to average...but we were more than happy with that.
After a quick pick up at stoooomarket we arrived at the MIDDY pretty much on schedule ( just after 1200). We were greeted with the ever wonderfull old lawnmower display :) JD handed around a steam train tickets before mark and a few other light weights disapeared into the cafe for a lovely victoria sponge and a cup of tea. After this had been consumed it was straight into the beer carriage. We were greeted by happy friendly staff and six beers on gravity. These included Earl soem (Victoria, and Albert), Cliff Quey (Bitter) Oakams (JHB) Gannetts Mild, and Humpty Dumpty ('Reedcutter). Although I thought maybe the Albert was slightly past its best the rest of the ale was fabulous. After a couple of pints I decided to make use of the train ticket. We embarked on the short trip 'just up the track' to the tractor/plowing competition...which was great... a tractor had broken down right in front of us... there was much faffing and then a loud bang!.. before we knew it, it was time to head back. Ted Ted ( so good they named him twice) pointed out to me and my dad that he had cleverly nabbed the first class area!! cheeky! Mark was grumberling ( whats new!) about his 25 year old Adnams jumper which he had snagged on the gate on the way back to the museum and keith asked one of the volunteers if he could take a photo of his hair! (honestly-you cant take him any where!). After some more beer the staff opened up the restoration shed for us to have a nosey around. They showed us the soon to be 'new bar carrage' and explained about how they were going to 'do it up'. After discussions about how great it would be to live in an old railway carriage it was time for some more beer :O)
We reluctantly left a short while and a good few beers later. However this was not the last leg of our mini adventure. There was more fun in store (market) for us. After we identified some people that were on the bus that shouldnt have been (tourists thinking it was a short round trip as part of the museum) and let them off the bus we stopped off at a couple of pubs on the way back (as you do). There was the 'Royal William' Which had ales on gravity including Pitfield, Redfox, Thwaites, and Mersea Mud ! We sat and chilled out in the garden here admiring again Keiths technicolour beer mat waist coat drinking our top notch beer that only cost us £2.60. The Kings Arms was our next stop. Levelly black, Gold Medal, Grain-IPA, Dark Star-Saison, and Wherry were available here. We talked about how we should release a song called 'Drink Wherry, be hoppy'... and about the National News...important things like the Lion on the loose in St Osyth.
Things got a bit musical (well sort of) on the way home. The duck whistle made a re-appearance, as did the reply duck whistle (to the tune of Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia). Nigel made a glamourous departure from the bus to the tune of BYE BYE NIGEL, NIGEL BYE BYE, and a vague resemblance to Bohemian Rhapsody was demonstrated. Its no wonder the lady who climbed onto our bus thinking it was a 'normal bus ' into town got scared and got off before we pulled away from the Rovers Tye, following a traditional 'wee stop'. Not mentioning any names K......
Thanks to jt, jd, dave on the bus, all the volunteers at the middy and everyone who came on the trip for a wonderful day out :)
Georgie