There will be a rare opportunity to experience the sights, sounds and atmosphere of yesteryear when a Great Railways Touring Company train comes to Blackpool North on Friday morning 21st April.

On Friday 21st April  the train will leave Blackpool North and it heads to  to Scarborough via the Calder Valley. Passengers will depart from Blackpool and travel across the Fylde to Preston and Blackburn,  and take the Calder Valley route to Yorkshire. At Burnley, the train will join the Calder Valley line that runs via the 749 feet Copy Pit Summit, a very steep climb all the way from Burnley, graded at 1 in 65. In active steam days, banking locomotives would again be attached to freight trains going over the summit. Nearby Rose Grove shed provided much of the motive power for this line and its bankers before being taken out of service in 1968.

Descending towards Hall Royd Junction, it will join the line from Manchester via Rochdale and follow the steep-sided Calder Valley line through Hebden Bridge and Brighouse towards York. The route passes through many former coalfields and has an air of industrialisation from the days of the Yorkshire mining industry.

After York, famous for the National Railway Museum and the historic city centre, the train takes the Scarborough line and follows the River Derwent on its meandering course to the east coast. The line twists and turns through the Derwent Valley at Kirkham Abbey, noted for its Cistercian Abbey. Also nearby is the historic Castle Howard house, once served by its own station. The train will pass through the large market town of Malton and continue eastwards with the Yorkshire Wolds visible in the distance to Scarborough.

For more details of this journey and other trips go to https://www.railwaytouring.net/the-great-britain-xv—april-2023