Steaming in Swanage

Today we had been invited to visit our friends L &P at at their  holiday flat in Swanage. We were joined by our friends, M&P, from Salisbury. Unfortunately, it was a pretty damp and misty day, which ruled out a walk on the  Downs or cliff tops. So, instead, we wandered into Swanage town centre where we were just in time to see a  train hauled by steam engine  Eddystone arrive from Norden (Corfe Castle.). Here you see the  engine running round to make the  return trip. So, it was exactly 57 years  since steam finished on this line, although later it returned thanks to dedicated volunteers. We met one of them today: the 82 year old station master, who having had a railway career, retired  to Swanage to volunteer on the heritage  railway. He was a fount  of knowledge, telling us all about  their Pullman observation  car (previously an ambulance carriage used in wartime) and  how the price of coal  has risen by 500% in recent years, since coal mines here closed, and they have had to import  from Czechoslovakia.