Saturday 15 January 2011

Time for Pint

The Astolat Model Railway Circle Annual Exhibition on Saturday 15 Jan went very well indeed after a quick set up of only 17 mins from getting out of the car to running a loco. Much to my surprise the layout performed admirably as it did at its last outing at Railex in May 09, with the only 2 derailments of the whole day being caused by not placing stock properly onto the fiddle yard tracks in the first place - duh!


The newly installed working level crossing gates went down a treat with the audience, that and the sunflowers growing in the crossing keeper's garden (why bother with the trains?). A special thank you must go to Dave Renshaw who kindly gave up his day to assist running trains  - I hope it wasn't too stressful!


The tweeded gent to the left isn't an escapee from a society finescale railway modelling gathering,  but the charming Bob Symes who may be familiar to those who remember 1960's & 70's TV - Model World and Tomorrow's World. Amongst other things he also hosted 'Bob's Your Uncle' (Childrens Channel) in the late 1980's.

Enough from me, even though Dave R did all the work running the trains, it's now time for a pint. Next? Full steam ahead with Brewhouse Quay! Toot toot!

3 comments:

  1. It's wonderful to know that Bob Symes is still with us. It was him and his Model World TV show that was one of the reasons why I got into the hobby in the first place. Didn't the show feature the construction of a model of Horsted Keynes station?

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    1. Hi Trainspotter, yes the Programmes in the early days certainly did include a model of Horsted Keynes. Bob Symes was instrumental in rekindling my fire too, and I am still at it, 40 years later! ~Very happy memories of those early TV programmes.

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  2. I met Robert Alexander Baron Schutzmann von Schutzmansdorff (to use his full name according to Wikipedia) in Brighton show while exhibiting Hellingly. We had a bit of a chat and he managed to know more about the subject than I did despite my research !
    Top bloke who will be back on the telly the moment I get to be controller of BBC 1.

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