Flying Scotsman to Carlisle: 4th, 14th, 18th and 21st December.

We were not held at KS, but we did stop at Appleby to give the passengers a chance for a leg stretch and ice cream, in lieu of the Langwathby water stop which was not required.

 

That's very strange as I don't remember stopping, must have been in deep conversation with someone. Maybe we were catching the Leeds Carlisle stopper, we also stopped at Hellifield for a couple of minutes for that reason.

 

On paper the return via Shap should have been much better timed that previous runs, new timetable may be, however, in reality, it was not to be. We pulled into the Plumpton loop with several services scheduled to pass, but it was obvious from RTT that two of them were running late, some 40 minutes in the case of one and about half that with the other. So after 2 had passed there was going to be a c25 minute wait before the first of those running late, did control or whoever was in charge let us get on our way with the option of stopping again in one of the various loops? no. Time table says we follow 1M15 no ifs or buts.
So we sat there in total for an hour before moving off 20 minutes late. The irony was that as we proceeded briskly, a TP was closing, fast but we swept past Low Gill loop with it a couple of blocks behind and losing time until it stopped at Oxenholme, and was again close behind as we were slowed before Carnforth. This meant that taking FS off and adding a diesel took us beyond our departure time so again had to wait for another TP to pass at Preston, hence 20 minutes late at Victoria.
I must say that we had no complaints from passengers as they were well updated on the reasons for our delays.

 

All three in the region of 150/180 dining 40/70 1st and 60/100 standard, didn't count them but I would think that they are a reasonable approximation.

 

We had quite a few members of Team Riley on board each trip, obviously the support crew, but also enjoying the cushions as well, all seemed happy with the way things were going.