I had predicted that Week 13 would probably be a quiet one. The same proved to be true of week 14. There were no dedicated trainspotting trips in either week.
At the end of week 13 I travelled to Wingate & Finchley’s match away to league leaders Hornchurch. The closest station to their ground is Upminster Bridge. I already told the story of my route to the match in my Last on the Card post, so I’ll content myself with a shot of a Docklands Light Railway unit arriving at Bank station…
I logged 78 of which I needed 5 and I also picked up 8 new for haulage. Not a bad bag for a non-spotting outing. The football was good too! Wingate & Finchley were able to beat Hornchurch 2-1 and improve our chances of being in the play-off spots at the end of the season. Here’s Elliot striking our second goal from the edge of the box…
The start of week 14 was a bank holiday Monday and we welcomed Potters Bar to Summers Lane. This was another great win for the blues – 3-1 and another 3 points to the total 😎 Here’s some mid-field action with Alkeo on the receiving end of a shoulder charge…
On the Tuesday I was back on the tracks, this time with Epi for company as we travelled to Mottingham…
…for a visit to Eltham Palace, one time home of Stephen and Virginia Courtauld and now an English Heritage property. The palace dates back to the 13th century when Bishop Anthony Bek acquired the Manor and built his home here. He donated the Manor to Edward II. The Manor then became a royal palace and was extended in 1315-16 by Edward’s Queen Isabella. There were a number of other expansions over the years including a great hall that was built in the 1470’s. The palace was ransacked during the English Civil War and fell into disuse and for a time was a farm with the surviving great hall being used as a barn.
The Courtaulds came looking for somewhere to build an out of town residence, saw the remains of the palace and decided to buy the land. They commissioned architects Seely & Paget to build a new ‘Palace’ in the art-deco style but incorporating the great hall. The modern building is thus a mix of 1930’s and Medieval architecture and design….
On the trip I logged 50 sightings of which I needed 3. I also picked up a couple of units for haulage.
The rest of the week was spent locally. Hopefully the forthcoming week will see a couple of dedicated spotting trips although there is a football match on Tuesday night which will disrupt things once more.
Start of a new month and time to join in with Brian’s Last on the Card Challenge😎👍
I’m going to be a bit naughty this time – As my long-suffering Canon 5D has been retired from active duty, I will share the last footy shot of the month as well as the last general shot from the Fujifilm X-H2s.
This week all my shots were taken on Saturday 30/03/2024. Lets go earliest to latest.
Saturday’s football match was an away game over at Hornchurch which entailed getting a train out to Upminster Bridge. There are a couple of ways to get there and my preferred option this time was to go down to Bank on the Northern Line and then take the DLR to Limehouse where I would catch the c2c service to Upminster. I took this shot of 357003 with the Fuji X-H2s while waiting for my train at Limehouse…
Once I got to Upminster it was a single station hop on the District Line back to Upminster Bridge. From there it’s a short walk to the ground along the A124 Upminster Road and up Bridge Avenue. This shot of the A124 was taken using the Moto g50…
…Some serious cropping and that will be a nice shot😂
Finally, after the match against league leaders Hornchurch, I have this shot of three of our players leaving the pitch. The Fuji X-H2s’ metering has really been conned by the light in this one😅…
…Ben seems to be offering some advice to Bobby. Something along the lines of “Stop showing your underwear to the cameraman – he gets all excited!” 🤣 As a post script, Hornchurch could have won the league and promotion on the day with a win. Instead we became the first team to beat them at home this season and, in doing so, keep our own play-off hopes alive. The Isthmian League’s own reporter was there to watch the match so for once there is an unbiased report on the game.
This week started on Tuesday with an outing to one of my freedom pass boundaries – a trip on the Southwestern to Feltham. I had hoped to start with another Class 701 ride but didn’t make it in time after choosing to take the bus to Brent Cross West and pick up a Thameslink to London Bridge from there. From London Bridge I took the short hop across to Waterloo East and walked across the bridge into Waterloo station, arriving at 10:33. With the Windsor service that the 701’s are working gone I picked up a Class 458 unit out to Clapham Junction.
At Clapham Junction, I know that there is an engineering train booked through platform 2 at around 11:20 so I made my way over to platform 5 with the intention of photographing it. On the way to the end of the platform I was accosted by an estate agent! No, he wasn’t trying to sell me part of the station😅 In fact, he spotted me swapping lenses on my camera and approached me for some photography advice. He has to do a mix of drone views and still photographs of the houses he is selling and was wondering about ISO settings and how they work. We had a friendly 10 minute chat while he was waiting for his train and then I completed my stroll to the end of the platform.
The engineers train duly turned up with recently built 69010 in charge…
…Back in Steam days, newly constructed locomotives were painted in workshop grey for their ex-works photograph before being painted in the company livery prior to entry into service. GBRf (GB Railfreight) however, seem to be quite happy to send out a locomotive in undercoat! These ‘new’ class 69’s are being painted in a variety of colour schemes, so it may be a case of having to enter service while the corporate mind decides what livery the loco will ultimately receive! I have used the term ‘recently built’ and ‘new’ about the Class 69’s but they are actually re-engined Class 56 locos. If you want the full story, look up Class 69 on Wikipedia.
I continued my trip out to Feltham…
…Where I caught a shot of 701043 working the Windsor and Eton run on its trip back to Waterloo…
I wandered back to Clapham with a stop off at Richmond for lunch where I caught this shot of a District Line train passing the 1940 built Southern Railway signal box…
Back at Clapham I was pleasantly surprised to see 378229 – one of the two outstanding 378’s I need for haulage, so I hopped on that to West Brompton before doing some London Underground spotting and riding on my way home. Totals for the day – 162 logged of which I needed 15. I made 12 trips and every one of those was a Winner!
Thursday was another Freedom Pass run – This time to Swanley on the Southeastern…
…Where I photographed 375922 on a fast Ramsgate to London Victoria service. The trip also coincided with a Belmond British Pullman special and I was able to photograph that too…
…although it’s not the most inspiring of images. There are a couple of other vantage spots that I didn’t get to try out but that will give me an excuse to visit again in future.
I broke up my trip home to add some more units for haulage, initially catching a train to Bromley South. I walked across Bromley, picking up some lunch on the way, before boarding 465186 at Bromley North for the short trip to Grove Park. I then train hopped to Hither Green, Lewisham and London Bridge before heading home via West Hampstead and Gospel Oak. Totals for the day; 93 logged of which I needed 11 and 6 new for haulage.
Saturday was a football awayday with Wingate & Finchley visiting Billericay Town. With many of the players living on the east side of London there was no coach to the ground so I decided to turn it into a trainspotting trip. I made my way to Stratford where I spent around an hour and a half spotting before boarding a Southend service to Billericay.
The match was a hard-fought affair in which Billericay took the lead on 10 minutes. They then spent most of the rest of the game protecting their lead – a risky strategy. I was doing my usual photography role and caught this foul on Matty – more fitting to Rugby than Football…
…It earned the ‘Ricay player a yellow card although it must have been borderline red as it looked like he denied a clear goalscoring opportunity. It was still 1-0 to the home side on 90 minutes and the Ref indicated there would be a minimum of 8 minutes of Injury time. One thing our Manager seems to have instilled in the side is the importance of playing to the very end of the game. On 90+5 Zack equalised…
…and on 90+9 we took the lead with Joseph Boachie slotting home. There was just time for ‘Ricay to make a last ditch attack which ended with our keeper gratefully clutching the ball. A 2-1 away win of the ‘Smash & Grab Raid’ variety! Both keepers were seen flaked out on the ground in the aftermath…
It was a very happy group of Wingate fans who walked back to the station to catch the Southend to Liverpool Street train operated by 720’s 524 & 560…
It was an excellent day out for me – An away win, 113 trains logged of which I needed 15 and I also picked up 5 new for haulage😎👍
Week 13 is ahead and it will be a disrupted week with a football match on Tuesday and again on Saturday, so I think I will only get in a single spotting trip. See you soon😀👌
Images from Finchley 