All aboard for a vintage rail trip
Reporter: Janice Barker
Date published: 14 August 2009
A last chance to have a nostalgic trip on a 1950s-style holiday train from Oldham is being offered by an enterprising gap-year student.
James Palmer (19) who is due to study transport management at Aston University in October, has spent his gap year running Retro Railtours.
The company has organised three classic journeys on old-style trains, including Pullman coaches, to Edinburgh, Bristol and now the third to the Lake District.
On Saturday, August 29, the Bank Holiday weekend, the train will call at Shaw around 7.45am and Oldham around 8am. James, from Ashton, who employs his mum as company secretary, said: “We are travelling up the very scenic Cumbrian Coast line to Ravenglass for the miniature steam railway and other tourist sights, or Whitehaven, a quaint old port town or you can continue up to Carlisle for a short stop there.
“The train will be hauled by two 1957 vintage Class 20 locomotives, built by English Electric at Newton-le-Willows, and the coaches will be ex-British Rail Intercity coaches from the 1960s/70s.”
Another nostalgic touch is three classes of ticket — standard, first class and Pullman dining.
And James is offering them to Chronicle readers, with a £5 discount, at £49, £75 and £130, respectively.
Contact details are 0161 330 9055, email- info@retrorailtours.co.uk, or www.retrorailtours.co.uk
