It’s Thursday July 28 1960 and my weeklong plan to see as many North Eastern Region locomotives as possible, using a Railrover ticket, has hit a bit of a snag. I’d fallen asleep on an overnight train from York, missed my stop at Newcastle and had ended up in Edinburgh.
Now I was trying to get the day back on track with a visit to West Auckland shed. But it just wasn’t my day…
The directions in my Shed Directory looked pretty straightforward: “Turn right . . . into the main West Auckland Road. Continue for about 1½ miles and turn left into the main Shildon Road.”
From there it would be obvious: “A cinder path leads to the shed from the right-hand side of this road, just before the railway bridge.”
Compiler Aidan Fuller suggested it was a 40-minute walk but I’d already found that his timings were fairly easy for a fit young enthusiast and I confidently expected to shave ten minutes off the walk. With luck, I could be back at Bishop Auckland station in just over an hour.
But Lady Luck had deserted me that day.
After an hour’s walking, I was in the middle of nowhere. I could see no sign of a railway, let alone a shed. I wasn’t even sure I could retrace my steps. I could do nothing except carry on walking. Following the distant sound of
