D16 Steaming up

Today I worked down at the railway. It was an awful wet winters day and yet they came to ride our train. Today they were running the D16 which is much older than AB699 but not near so impressive size wise. 
I was so busy and the eftpos machine kept playing up however all was good . Had scout group all the way from Christchurch and a huge group of heart kids with their parents and many more. We didn't even get a lunch break, ate a sandwich and a cup of cold tea on the run.
A photography friend called so handed out my camera and said grab me a blip photo as knew I wasn't going to get out there.  The church in the background is the Catholic church and is coming down this week because of the earthquake damage 10 years ago. It is really sad, has had a fence around it ever since. A new building is going up in its place.

Was glad to get home and turn the fire up after a thoroughly enjoyable day. Its all about seeing the joy on the faces and knowing your doing something worthwhile for the community. It takes a lot of volunteers to run it and many of them come from out of town, men that love playing trains. The hours those men put in each week repairing cleaning polishing etc is amazing