Great Western Coffee Shop

Sideshoots - associated subjects => The Lighter Side => Topic started by: Red Squirrel on July 20, 2019, 14:09:46



Title: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: Red Squirrel on July 20, 2019, 14:09:46
Red Squirrel was out and about last week - but where did he go?

1. Barrow in Furness - Adelante_CCT
(https://zemblanity.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/wherewas072019-2-scaled.jpg)

2. Keswick - PhilWakely
(https://zemblanity.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/wherewas072019-1-obfuscated-scaled.jpg)


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: johnneyw on July 20, 2019, 17:22:36
Hmmm, I've spend some considerable time on this and have only managed to work out that it's a station covered by First/GWR from the corporate colour scheme..
I've been reduced to searching for the full name of the café in the first picture in order to perhaps identify the station but to no avail.
This is what happens after a while when you are confined to home with a streaming cold.



Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: Red Squirrel on July 20, 2019, 17:48:52
Image No.1 is not served by GWR, and as far as I am aware it is not served by a First subsidiary either - though it may have been in the past.

The cafe is a caféxpress.


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: johnneyw on July 20, 2019, 21:56:50
But image one is a railway station, right?
Image two looks like an old pub or hotel but it doesn't look like it's near image one if the view through the glass doors is anything to go by.
The more I look at image 1 the more that critter is mocking me! 😕


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: JayMac on July 20, 2019, 22:45:25
Me too. There appears to be a semaphore signal visible through the doors in picture one.

Does that help me? Not really!


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: johnneyw on July 20, 2019, 23:05:20
I concur, well spotted! The Cafexpress part of the building seems significantly higher than the signal suggesting the platforms are in a cutting perhaps? Looks like it could be a sloping footway through the doors to the platform.
Still scratching my head though.


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: ellendune on July 20, 2019, 23:09:17
It's not Holyhead is it?


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: Chris from Nailsea on July 21, 2019, 00:31:59
Taunton.





Well, it's worth a shout - for me, anyway, with my track record.  ::) :o ;D


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: Adelante_CCT on July 21, 2019, 10:21:42
Barrow-in-Furness?


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: Red Squirrel on July 21, 2019, 10:42:08
Spot on! It is indeed. I have just spent the last 20 minutes stringing together a load of clues to help the others, but you've put us all out of our misery!

No.2 is in the same neck of the woods...

(oh, and I see what you did there... fur... very good... ;) )


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: johnneyw on July 21, 2019, 11:38:44
Ah, I see what you mean about not GWR territory. Looking at online photos of the station puzzles me though as I can't see one that fits every aspect of the first clue as I visualized it. Shows how the mind interprets the eye.


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: Red Squirrel on July 21, 2019, 12:06:09
We were in the waiting room on Platform 1, which is on the south-west side of the station, looking east: https://goo.gl/maps/xai1ENHXATeDmNKbA . You can just make out the bridge of Abbey Road behind the signal.

Any thoughts on No.2?


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: Timmer on July 21, 2019, 12:50:39
The waiting room probably being in First corporate colours from the days TPX used to operate there before their services were handed over to Northern.


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: johnneyw on July 21, 2019, 17:35:56
We were in the waiting room on Platform 1, which is on the south-west side of the station, looking east: https://goo.gl/maps/xai1ENHXATeDmNKbA . You can just make out the bridge of Abbey Road behind the signal.

Any thoughts on No.2?

Going by the location of the first picture I would not be a all surprised if No.2 was somewhere a little north from there in the Lake District, perhaps railway related such as an old railway hotel?


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: Red Squirrel on July 21, 2019, 18:02:06
We were in the waiting room on Platform 1, which is on the south-west side of the station, looking east: https://goo.gl/maps/xai1ENHXATeDmNKbA . You can just make out the bridge of Abbey Road behind the signal.

Any thoughts on No.2?

Going by the location of the first picture I would not be a all surprised if No.2 was somewhere a little north from there in the Lake District, perhaps railway related such as an old railway hotel?

You are getting very warm. The building in the photograph is railway related inasmuch as that it was a railway station...


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: PhilWakely on July 21, 2019, 18:06:01
Keswick station?


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: Red Squirrel on July 21, 2019, 18:49:40
Indeed it is! I had to blur out the sign, which (perhaps remarkably) survives the station's 1972 closure:

(https://zemblanity.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/keswick-sign.jpg)

The railway hotel is next door, and is a rather more impressive structure:

(https://zemblanity.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/keswick_hotel_scaled.jpg)

The station building, once HQ of the Cockermouth, Keswick and Penrith railway, is now part of the hotel. One platform and its canopy survive; the other platform and other buildings have been demolished for car parking.


Title: Re: Red Squirrel on and off the rails
Post by: johnneyw on July 21, 2019, 19:31:53
About this time of year in 1977 we stayed a couple of miles East along the line in some converted buildings between the river and the old railway track. From what I've just looked at it was Low Briery. Even then I can still remember my brother and myself exploring the old railway line.

Edit: I wondered about that lack of apparent signage on the old building in picture 2.



This page is printed from the "Coffee Shop" forum at http://gwr.passenger.chat which is provided by a customer of Great Western Railway. Views expressed are those of the individual posters concerned. Visit www.gwr.com for the official Great Western Railway website. Please contact the administrators of this site if you feel that content provided contravenes our posting rules ( see http://railcustomer.info/1761 ). The forum is hosted by Well House Consultants - http://www.wellho.net