A Bit Of A Disappointment
The next day, Friday, had been earmarked for a special jaunt to the Ffestiniog and Welsh Highland Railway, with the trip booked on the Mountain Prince option; we were especially looking forward to this, and being able to travel round The Spiral, and to the place where we could disembark for an hour and have a cream tea, before the return journey to Porthmadog.
"The restoration of the Ffestiniog Railway took almost thirty years before returning to Blaenau Ffestiniog. One of the major hurdles was a reservoir which had flooded the line during closure. A major project to raise the railway up to enable it to go round the side of the reservoir was ‘The Deviation’ involving a new tunnel and a great spiral of track being built around Dduallt station, a remote halt in the mountains.
This heritage style service will take you above the treeline beyond Tan-y-Bwlch to Dduallt, including a trip around the spiral, the amazing volunteer project built in the 1970s with huge cuttings, high embankments and a bridge over the top of the line along which you have just travelled. There are some great views beyond Tan-y-Bwlch over the delightful Vale of Ffestiniog and towards distant mountains."
Our trip was booked on the 13.40 service, and we had been asked to arrive at 13.00, so that we could meet our host, and choose which carriage we would like to travel in. We knew that once you leave England and enter Wales, it is a two-hour drive to the Station; the roads are interesting, and we didn't want to be in any hurry, so we left early and arrived at Porthmadog at about 12.30 p.m.
Well, we must be fated to have this trip delayed! We had already cancelled an earlier reservation in June, because of concerns about the virus, and I'd rebooked it for September - reckoning, rightly, that restrictions and worries would be lessening by now. However! this had not taken into account the fact that steam locos are mechanical beasts and liable to failing; and this is what had happened earlier that morning, leaving one loco stranded up the mountain.
Everyone was terribly apologetic about it. Of course, we understood completely: engines fail, and there would be no steam on the Mountain Prince today.
We sat on the platform for a while, and had an ice cream; I went for a wander to see the other loco in steam, that was running with a different service that had started out from Caernarfon. This was an ex-South African Railways/Suid Afrikaanse Spoorwee Garrett loco, and looking very smart indeed. Alas for us, that particular service was fully booked! and in any case there was no chance of us boarding an alternative trip to Caernarfon, as there would have been no train to return us from there to Porthmadog; but I did get up on the footplate with Wendy, and the Guard took a couple of photos of us.
There is very little space on these footplates - Wendy and I really had to squash up together and lean forward to be in the frame:
Wendy and me on the footplate - and that isn't a plaster on Wendy's arm, just the sunlight!
I remember the Garretts in East Africa, and the times when we travelled overnight, and the steward would come in to make up our beds for the night. He (I remember them as always being stewards) would come in, laden with a couple of "bedrolls", and transform our compartment from the day-time seating arrangement into a two-berth cabin. When everything was secure, and the upper bunk locked into place, he would undo the straps around the bedding, unroll it all out, in two minutes turning the bunks into beds with crisply starched sheets (and equally crisply starched pillow slips over the pillows!) and fresh blankets. I can only remember drifting off to the gentle lullaby of the clicketty-clack, clicketty-clack of the carriages rattling down the track; and not stirring until morning.
Well, the lack of steam this day was a disappointment; but it had to be accepted, and we have got an "eternal" credit note to use for our next booking. Let's hope that it will be third time lucky!
So, an interesting day after all, and then the drive back to England, followed by a welcome dinner at the Beefeater Restaurant attached the hotel where we were staying.
Again, all the staff made us so welcome, it was a real "home from home" feeling, and after we got home from our break away, I was inspired to write a sonnet for them, which also formed part of my very favourable review on TripAdvisor:
A Poem For Preston Brook (A great place to stay and eat!)
by Alexandra Wilde
We took the chance of a few days away
To a place where we’ve stayed before:
At the Premier Inn at Preston Brook,
With the Beefeater right next door.
All the staff are terrific,
Charming, courteous and kind
They all pull together, as of one mind -
We couldn’t have enjoyed it more.
The welcome's so warm – they remember us,
And fulfil every wish without any fuss.
With Caren and Molly, Toni and Fran
Kathryn and Abi, India, Jo and Rhian.
They’re all five-star ladies, scoring 10 out of 10,
And we can’t wait to return to Preston again!
(...And that last rhyming couplet says it all!)
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