Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Previously, every region had a slightly
different time, based on the local sunrise
and sunset. Now everybody in Britain
kept the same time, so that rail timeta-
bles would work.
After World War I, there were 120 rail
companies in Britain, which were reduced
to four: the Great Western Railway; Lon-
don, Midland, and Scottish Railway (LMS);
London and North Eastern Railway
(LNER); and the Southern Railway. This
created an efficient, golden age of rail
travel. The LNER's Mallard still holds the
world steam speed record, reaching
126mph in 1938. This beautiful blue engine
is now at
Locomotion: The National Rail-
way Museum
at Shildon (p. 644), where
you can see many other historic trains
including the streamlined Duchess of
Hamilton—a 1938 Art Deco masterpiece.
The railways were nationalized in
1948, including industrial lines such as
the Ffestiniog Railway in North Wales.
You can travel on the Ffestiniog and
Welsh Highland Railways
(p. 730) from
the coast at Porthmadog to Blaenau
Ffestiniog (where you can visit the
slate
mine
—p. 723—or from Porthmadog to
Caernarfon
with its mighty castle;
p. 729). Both branches take you past
Snowdonia's spectacular scenery.
By 1955 the railways were losing so
much money that the network was “mod-
ernized.” Steam trains had largely already
been replaced by diesel engines, and now
some lines were electrified. But it was the
1963 report by Dr. Richard Beeching,
chairman of the British Railways Board,
that changed the rail network forever. He
recommended closing 5,000 miles of line
and more than 2,000 stations—throwing
thousands out of work and cutting off
remote areas. Among the lines that went
was the West Somerset Railway (p. 361).
Before it closed in 1971 it was used to film
the train carriage scenes in the Beatles'
film
A Hard Day's Night.
Reopened by
enthusiasts in 1976, it is now the longest
heritage railway in Britain.
Another victim was the Severn Valley
Railway, which is now a heritage line. Its
Bradley Manor station appeared in the
2005 movie
The Chronicles of Narnia: The
Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
, while
Keighley and Worth Valley Railway in
West Yorkshire was where 1970's
The
Railway Children
was filmed. The line
now has steam trains and Railway Chil-
dren events. For details of more than 250
rail museums and tourist lines see the
Heritage Railway Association
website
www.heritagerailways.com
.
2
carry on—left their tent and walked to his death so he would no longer be a burden,
uttering the immortal words: “I am just going outside and may be some time.” Scott
and the rest of his team were discovered in their tent in November 1912, with the last
entry in Scott's diary dated March 29. The
Scott Polar Research Institute
in Cam-
bridge (p. 500) has Scott's letters home and many other exhibits from his expeditions.
World Wars I & II (1914-45)
Britain joined World War I in August 1914 when Germany refused to withdraw from
Belgium. Among the soldiers who chronicled the horror of trench warfare was Rupert
Brooke, a Cambridge graduate who wrote the 1912 war poem
The Old Vicarage,
Grantchester.
Many people visit
Grantchester
(p. 497) to see the village church
mentioned in his poem, where the clock has been stopped at “ten to three”—and
where there's honey still for tea.
