A Grand Day Out

[Rob MacKillop]

My birthday treat: a day out at the Bo'ness and Kinneil railway museum and restoration workshop, including a ten-mile ride with a steam train and restored carriages, First Class, of course! What could be better? Nothing! https://www.bkrailway.co.uk

I came back with 237 images. In the editing room I did nothing to some, played around with others. What you see is what you get. in no particular order...

 

[Rob MacKillop]

More!

 

[Rob MacKillop]

Even more!

 

[Rob MacKillop]

Eek...



Recommended!

 

[Chris Bennett]

Gosh, there's a lot to look at here Rob. It looks like you had a busy day. Happy birthday to you, by the way.
What a great collection of memories for a grown up boy!

 

[Rob MacKillop]

Ha, yes, sorry for the overload. It’s rare I shoot so many. Even with digital cameras I try to keep within 36 shots, try to take each one as seriously as when shooting film. It’s a good habit. But sometimes you can load a few canisters…and it was my birthday! So, I’ll forgive myself

 

[Chris Bennett]

Not a complaint, by any means. They're too good to complain about!

 

[Pete Askew]

And there was me expecting to see some pictures of you skiing on the moon!

A grand day out indeed, and 7 rolls in nothing on your birthday, one per decade! What did you use last half a roll for (or did you squeeze a few more than 36 out of each - no comments on penny pinching here - it was your birthday after all!) ?

What a fabulous set (I'm not too sure about that stripy jumper in the selfie in the 3rd group though!), and someone certainly had some fun with the labelling in the mail wagon. The details of the linkages and the diesel engine are especially fine I think. I like the Saxa salt a lot as well. One of my favourites is the view looking down on the welding gear and pallet: there is something especially satisfying about that composition for some reason. And I love that 50s-sci-fi buggy thingy. The portrait of Susan in the train corridor is gorgeous and deserves to be printed I reckon.

 

[Rob MacKillop]

Thanks, Pete. I like that welding gear/pallet shot too. I'll print that. Susan quite likes her corridor image, and it will certainly get printed, but then she'll hide it forever...

The last half print was taken up with some succulents...

 

[Brian Moore]

What a smashing set. Your wife is lovely in a portrait, Rob. (You not so much. lol) Happy birthday! I haven't been on a steam locomotive since I was about 6. (My grand dad worked all his life for British Rail. Saturday trips from Burnside Station into Glasgow were weekly in frequency. But one day all the trains were diesel-electric. Alas, Choo-Choos no more.) That fotie of you switching the tracks suggests a degree of fun that may not be without mischievous intent. Overall, wonderful to see this set of images.

 

[Rob MacKillop]

Thanks, Brian, though I would argue that I make a lovely labradoodle!

I have fond memories of travelling by steam when I was young. My father got a job as a photo engraver for The Sun newspaper in Manchester, so we travelled between Dundee and there with some frequency for five years, before settling back in Dundee. I hated living in Manchester, and was sent to live with my grannie in Dundee every school holiday “for my health”. It was at a time when diesel was beginning to make an inroad into the rail network, but steam trains were far more impressive to an impressionable boy. My own current train set has two trains, one steam, one diesel, both dating as models from the late 50s, early 60s. There’s nothing wrong with a bit of nostalgia, unless you make it a political ideology and force Scotland out of Europe But that’s another story.