My husband loves to watch railway DVDs, I particularly enjoy watching old film footage because I am interested in history. I like watching footage of routes that are no longer in existence, it is fascinating to see how many railway buildings have survived and been adapted for other uses. Since my husband and I have been together we have found that his passion for trains and railways fits very well with my interest in history and photography.

My own interest in trains began in childhood, long before I met my husband. I spent my first six years as an only child living close enough to Northampton Castle Station to hear the trains. At night when I went to bed I listened to the familiar railway sounds. There was a much bigger goods yard back then so there was always something going on and the sounds of the railway became the background music to my life as familiar as bird song.

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Like so many other children I enjoyed the Rev Awdry’s railway stories about Thomas the Tank Engine and his friends, I knew all the engines by name. I think my dad enjoyed reading the stories to me, but the pictures were so detailed that I was happy to sit an look at the books on my own.

Image via Wikipedia

I loved to go to the park with my grandma, my favourite spot was not the playground or the stream, it was the special high bench in the far corner of the park. It enabled me to look across the river to the railway line, and I would sit there for hours watching trains. In those days there was much more traffic on the line, a child doing the same thing today would die of boredom! Steam was already a rarity, I did see a few steam trains, but I was just as happy to watch what my grandma called the smelly old diesels. I liked them, and even as a little girl I loved the freight trains. I used to walk across Westbridge a couple of times each week on the way to my aunt’s house. She would let me scramble up and look down over the wall at the station below, there was always something to see, I loved the sounds and the smells of the railway. I miss that, the smells have more or less gone and the sounds are different now.

When I went to college in London I found myself living right opposite a station and once again the sound of the railway became as familiar as my own heartbeat. Travelling by train and tube was an ordinary part of life so it is not really surprising that my husbands obsession with the railways has rekindled my own interest in trains.

Please take a look at my other railway articles

Travel Back in Time on The North Norfolk Railway

Discover The Beauty of Norfolk on The Bittern Line

The Sleeper Train to Penzance

A Preserved Railway Amid Beautiful Countryside

Adlestrop – Reflections on a Favourite Poem