Hi Everyone,
Welcome to this years’ newsletter. The first source of stress surfaced at the very end of last year as I dispatched the final emails of the 2024 newsletter, which contained an important note about my change of email address. The replacement new email address promptly died and caused several weeks of frustration. As far as I know, it may still be receiving items from you but I can’t read these or reply. Who knows what important messages still lurk in there? So I’m back to my old email address, which is miraculously working again, and this is alan.walters@talk21.com. 2025 did not go well with no BT telephone service for three weeks during the Summer. This was a most stressful time for us as we use this telephone a lot, even though we both have mobiles.
We said our final goodbyes to our friend Valerie and she was laid to rest in April when all her affairs and many, many papers had been sorted out, as we were her executors. That was a great relief and we faced the final step - the headstone for her resting place. Even this was a challenge as she had stipulated that it was not to be made in black stone! It now has pride of place in Mitcham cemetery in an eye-catching red marble stone, and which includes pictures of her and a cover of one the books she had written.
The RNLI (Lifeboat organisation) had been supported by Valerie for many years and we received a surprise invitation from RNLI to include her name on the bow of the Exmouth (Devon) lifeboat. Her name, accompanied by many others now sails the seas in that area, rescuing and saving lives. We were invited to visit the organisation at their base in Poole in Dorset to see the inscription.
Sadder news came when Anne’s cousin Leslie, who lived in Kent, died after several months in hospital. Since childhood they had been very close. Another long standing friend Barbara, mum to Alan’s first dancing partner Pauline, died at the age of 103 years. She was always a cheerful and interesting person and lovely to talk with us.
Some time in the past, possibly in 2024, Alan had, without knowing it, a minor stroke. This only became apparent during the latter part of the year when he was aware that he wasn’t walking so steadily (as if he had drunk a few pints, but he hadn’t!), was having trouble in finding the right words during conversations and his eyesight was changing for the worse. He was sent to Croydon University Hospital for checks and a head scan revealed that he had had a minor stroke, mainly due to high blood pressure. He is being brought back gradually to normality by tablets and exercise. The only pain was to his wallet to the tune of £400 to increase his travel insurance!
Another long time friend and colleague of Anne named Wally died in April and we went to his funeral in Swindon. The funeral was unusual in that, apart from gentle background music, nobody said a word about Wally, or any thing else.
And, to make our year complete, Alan’s driving licence has now been cancelled, as his eyesight is no longer good enough. The best thing he ever did was work for British Rail and to move to Coulsdon. We have five bus routes with lots of buses, two railway stations with lots of trains, three airports with lots of planes and our Freedom Passes to get around, so we don’t often need a car! Well, that’s got all the bad news out of the way!
2025 marked our 50th Wedding Anniversary – how to celebrate? A big party? A World cruise? No, we settled for a few days in Buxton, Derbyshire to coincide with the Gilbert and Sullivan annual festival, during which we enjoyed several superb shows. The last day had been earmarked to see our friends who live in nearby Macclesfield and we set off in their car to explore the beautiful countryside, finding by chance that this was ‘Bomber Country’ where in the Second World War the RAF practiced attacking dams located in deep valleys, for the big attack on the North German dams.
Earlier in the year we went to see the show about Paddington Bear and also had a good night at the theater singing along to our favorite Bee Gee songs performed by a superb tribute group. Quite separately we went with friends Pat and Tony to 23 Fenchurch Street in London, better known as the ‘Walky Talky’ building where, over lunch on the 37th floor, you could look down on the city and across the River Thames to The Shard opposite. A later visit to the nearby Horizon 22 building reached to 84 floors and London really looked more like a model city far below! Older readers, who can cast their minds back to the 1960’s may recall the radio show ‘Round the Horne’, a rather ‘earthy’ comedy with much smut and ‘double entendres’! This is now revived in a show currently touring the country and was so, so funny. If this is your sort of entertainment, don’t miss it!
South Africa
Our main holiday this year was to South Africa in November-December, our first long trip for several years which included Cape Town, the famous ‘Blue Train’- a two-day luxury trip by train - and a wild animal safari park - famous for being home to the ‘Big Five’ – including elephants. rhinoceros, giraffe and lions plus many other species. The trip lasted for two weeks.
After a 15 hour night flight from London in winter, we arrived in late spring at a warm Cape Town, a large and modern city, famous for its waterfront and close proximity to Robben Island (where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for the first 18 years of his sentence). Close by is access to Table Mountain, from the top of which there are wonderful views over the whole region, including the attractive circular headland jutting into the Atlantic Ocean. It is also where many penguins come ashore in large numbers at the town of Boulder, where they are admired by many visitors. The Waterfront is known for many water-based attractions. In South Africa’s late spring, the weather is pleasantly warm as our coach ventured around the attractive Cape. The following day we saw more of the city, rode the chairlift to the top of Table Mountain, and visited the of the famous Stellenbosch vineyards. Our last day in Cape Town was spent visiting the fascinating waterfront and the aquarium where we saw many colouful fish, some sharks and penguins being hand fed.
- Cape Town fromTable Mountain
The next day we bid farewell to Cape Town and boarded the famous Blue Train for the three-day journey to Pretoria. This ‘luxury train’, filled with daytime/sleeping compartments, a restaurant, observation car and relaxation lounge made somewhat slow progress past mountain ranges and plains, with quite long stops in loops (lay bys) to let other trains pass in the opposite direction. The interior of the train had seen better days and we were not the only passengers to complain about some facilities, such as air conditioning and heating, which failed to operate. We had a break at Kimberly, famous for the first discovery of diamonds and visited the Great Hole where the diamonds had been mined. The train, a private operation, was at the mercy of the national railway service and had a reputation for not running to time, with stories of several hour delays. We experienced this at first hand as some unexpected track failure made us grind to a halt and we stayed put for three hours and had to be rescued by road caches for the rest of the journey. On the plus side, all good quality meals and unlimited drinks were provided. Having been rescued by our coach, after 45 minutes this broke down and we had to transfer to another vehicle in the pitch dark on a busy road!
The next day we set forth for the final element of our holiday. After a long morning drive on the coach, we arrived at a sunken forest, deep in a valley. Sadly, heavy rain soon put a stop to this exploration and we continued to our destination. Kruger Safari Park – a very large area of trees and bush is where wild animals roam and live in their own natural environment. Not known for lying in, these creatures come to life when the sun comes up, that is around 3.30 am. So, an early departure on our jeep-style vehicles was needed each day at five o clock. Within minutes, we were up close with three giraffes, and then a little later, a lion and his mate were just three feet away from us. Not to be outdone, a large group of elephants emerged from the bush nearby and ploughed ahead with a big elephant, clearly in charge, leading the way, followed by the rest of the group and their youngsters, with another big elephant bringing up the rear. An unforgettable sight!
We were lucky to see lots of zebra, beautiful species of deer, lots more elephants and giraffes, hyenas – even a leopard stretched out on the branch of a tree. All in all, a super experience, not to mention the antics of a group of baboons, which lived in the grounds of our charming hotel and noisily chased each other over the rooftops.
Far too soon it was time to head home with another long coach trip to
Johannesburg airport, pausing for a countryside coffee stop where
ostriches and a rhino could be spotted near by.
At eight pm our giant British Airways double-deck Airbus climbed into the night sky and it was still dark when we arrived at Heathrow the next morning.
Happy New Year from Anne and Alan
Note: If you enjoy the finer things in life such as railways, read on!
Bluebell Giants of Steam was another successful event, this year celebrating steam locomotives that have been built over the last 25 years. The Bluebell’s own locomotive ‘Beachy Head’ was joined by Great Western Saint Class ‘Lady of Legend’, LNER Peppercorn A1 class, ‘Tornado’, the largest of the four locomotives, and Great Western Betton Grange. On Saturday afternoon, all four locos were lined up across the tracks at Horsted Keynes.
Earlier in the year was the Bluebell’s Branch Line gala, which featured a 2-6-2 tank loco from the Isle of Wight and an Austerity 0-6-0 saddle tank loco, which failed before the gala started and spent its visit out of action in the engine shed.
Edinburgh and Cornwall - to see the famous High Speed Trains continuing to work since the nineteen sixties. A few of the three and four carriage ‘Castle Class’ units are still operational, mainly between Plymouth and Penzance, this bendy route allowing little chance for 125 mph. Despite major signaling upgrades last year, a few working semaphore signals survive. In Scotland there are a number of HSTs on the main routes from Edinburgh and Glasgow to Aberdeen and Inverness and a special thrill was to travel over both the River Tay bridge and Forth railway Bridge on one of these HSTs.
The Watercress (Mid-Hants) Railway’s summer diesel gala featured twelve types on an intensive service. My favourite Class 52 ‘Western Champion’ was among the visiting guest locomotives.
Their 2025 Spring steam gala was blessed with the first appearance of their Merchant Navy ‘Canadian Pacific’ which gleamed in its new paintwork following a very long overhaul. Another star of the show was the first appearance away from its home base at the Swanage Railway, in it’s stunning light green livery, of London and South Western Railway 4-4-0 number 563. A Lancashire and Yorkshire 0-6-0 tender loco completed the line up, together with an LMS saddle tank loco.
The theme for the Severn Valley Autumn Diesel gala, was the Class 37 locomotive and there was a large collection, in a variety of colour schemes, in action.
That’s all folks!
