Great Western Coffee Shop

Where are these ... each in FGW territory this time.  One each please.

1.
(http://www.wellho.net/ql/q1.jpg)

2.
(http://www.wellho.net/ql/q2.jpg)

3.
(http://www.wellho.net/ql/q3.jpg)

4.
(http://www.wellho.net/ql/q4.jpg)

5.
(http://www.wellho.net/ql/q5.jpg)

6.
(http://www.wellho.net/ql/q6.jpg)

7.
(http://www.wellho.net/ql/q7.jpg)

6 is Twyford, looking at a train coming in from the Henley branch.

Number 1 is Swindon.

7.  Kemble.  The old Tetbury Branch platform.  ;)

2. Pewsey

5) Chippenham ;)

All correct so far

1 Swindon
2 Pewsey
3
4
5 Chippenham
6 Twyford
7 Kemble

Just 3 and 4 to go!

3 is just outside Old Oak Common, towards Paddington- near Ladbroke Grove?

4 - somewhere on the Exmouth branch? I'd have a guess at the Lympstone Commando area.

Neither of those guesses is right, I'm afraid ... but then the late night crew took the easy ones and left the difficult questions for the morning.

Hi

Is no3 somewhere on the Bristol Triangle ?

Basset

Yes, indeed.   It was taken from a the train coming off the Rhubarb loop, back in the days when it ran northbound. And I believe the junction being approached is Dr Day's Bridge Junction.   Who was Dr Day?

Dr William Edward Day, was, I believe, a nineteenth century doctor who was known locally for his quack medical practices. He believed in the curative properties of rhubarb. He lived near the location of the junction in Barrow Road.

He did indeed live nearby. He was the first Vicar of the then new parish of St Luke's Barton Hill. His vicarage was a former country house now 60 Barton Hill Road.  Sadly the house is a shadow of its former glory, but it is still there.

For more information see http://www.bhhg.co.uk/showfiles.php?files=Barton%20Hill%20Vicarage (http://www.bhhg.co.uk/showfiles.php?files=Barton%20Hill%20Vicarage)

Amazing that a local history group gets this wrong.  I quote from the link (for which thanks)

'St. Lukes Vicarage is situated on the corner of Maze Street and Barton Hill Road'

It's nowhere near Maze Street.  If you Google Earth with '60, Barton Hill Road' and then Street View it, you will see why.

I understand loco crews called the chord, the 'rhubarb curve' or similar.  It had to do with the adjacent pub I believe, to which a quick dodge could be made while awaiting a path on the South Wales to South Coast coal trains.

My father was born in Barton Hill.  He attended St Peters before the war as head choirboy (now WW2-ruined on 'Castle Park' in the centre of Bristol) because St Lukes was considered too down-market.  The real reason was that St Peters (a businessman's church in the City proper) paid choir boys handsomely, so well worth the two mile walk on a Sunday from Barton Hill.   

Hi All,

Would like to take a guess at No4 think I know the Lupin but I have already had one, you usually state in the first 24 hours but this time just one each, I could be wrong but I dont want to Shouted at  ;)

Basset

Oh .. I'm not going to shout.  Please, yes, do go ahead ...

Hi Grahame,

After all that i am going to guess it was taken on the Severn beach Line?

Hide in shame if i am wrong

Basset

Alas no - but please don't hide.  Celebrate your bravery in taking a guess where few others have been brave.   This is the most difficult of the questions in this quiz, with few obvious clues.

Is #4 somewhere near Digby & Sowton perhaps?

Alas - under my definition it's nowhere near - sorry.

The picture isn't a particularly recent one, by the way - it's a picture I would be very surprised to be able to take at the moment.

Right, so the assumption of a 143 being in the Exeter area would be wrong. It's a single track line, with some sort of public access beside the track - separated by a mesh fence. The 143 itself appears to have yellow doors (I'd guess it's 143619 in its VisitBristol livery) - so I'd guess the Bristol area but obviously not the Severn Beach line? I can't for the life of me think where, though.

4. I'll hazard a guess at Melksham. For no other reason than it usually features in a selection from grahame!

Ah ... you know me so well  ;D

It was that buddleia that threw me on No 4.  I thought the Melksham variety was a bit more mauve in colour than the one pictured.

grahame. Could you explain why you wouldn't be able to take a similar picture at the moment? I know a 143 is unlikely to currently grace the line through Melksham. Is that the reason?

The lack of the 143 in the area, and the lack of flowers on the Buddlia ... that's all  :D    People were guessing at all sorts of places with trains off Exeter depot, and I felt a further clue would be useful,as the picture is pretty clue-less.

Oh, so nothing to do with the development in the area from where the photo was taken? Spencer's Gate isn't it?  ;)

I didn't cheat, honest. I Googled the image after I made my educated guess.

Makes a change from the "wrong sort of snow" - now we have the wrong colour flora!

Going back to the picture of the Henley branch train at Twyford, does anyone remember the time in the early 80s when a branch train overran the stops at Twyford and landed on a car waiting outside the station.  The car driver and the two dogs inside survived - although the dogs were missing overnight after the tailgate flew open and they ran off into the darkness.