Back on track

I was speaking in Selkirk tonight and I went by train on a line that was opened in 1849, closed in 1969 but then eventually reopened in 2015.

To be entirely accurate the restored Waverly line only goes as far as Tweedbank, which means that the last six miles was by car. But I was delighted by my first trip on the Borders Railway , which was debated often in the Parliament.

At 35 miles the line is the longest stretch of railway to be reopened in modern times anywhere in these islands as well as the longest line in Scotland since the opening of the West Highland Line in 1901.

I hope to travel it again before too long.

(BTW the reflected figure in one of the pictures is the local SNP Regional MSP Paul Wheelhouse who was my host tonight, and who is also a Transport minister - so a suitable subject to be included !)