The GWS’s Civil Engineering group hold a grand dinner every year, and as SPS has been working so closely with the CE group for the last 18 months an invitation has kindly been extended to SPS members.

The dinner is at The George Inn, Dorchester-on-Thames (near Wallingford), on Saturday 28 November. We will meet at The George at 7pm for a 7.30 dinner. The CE group are arranging some road transport from Didcot Station at 6.30pm. The George normally has at least four good beers: recently seen or sampled 6X, London Pride, Butcombe, Brakspear amongst others.

The cost for a 2-course meal, inc coffee etc, is £20. The cost for a 3-course meal, inc coffee etc, is £25. (Does not include drinks)

We are privileged to be invited to the CE group’s annual dinner – and are really pleased that SPS is cementing its links with the wider Railway Centre.

Please contact us via any of the usual methods if you would like to join in the dinner. There is a menu, which we will send you, from which selections need to be made by 22/11/15.

See you there!

Yes it will soon be time for holly, mistletoe, mulled wine and the arrival of hundreds of visitors at Didcot to visit Father Christmas!

Love them or hate them, there are two main attractions without which the wheels of the whole heritage railway sector would struggle to keep turning – Thomas and Santa. Most heritage railways rely heavily on the revenue from these events to keep running for the rest of the year. Didcot Railway Centre makes best use of both attractions by hosting ‘Thomas visits Santa’ days in December where families visit the Centre and all of its attractions, including a train journey on the branch line to meet Father Christmas in the broad gauge transfer shed.

Last year members of Swindon Panel Society gave help to DRC with the manning of these days, and we intend to do the same this year!

SPS members working together with GWS members, children’s entertainers and the Fat Controller in 2014.

While not directly related to Swindon Panel, the commercial success of the Thomas visits Santa days have a direct effect on the progress of the new building in which Swindon Panel will live, and on the success of Railway Centre as a whole, which has a direct bearing on the success of Swindon Panel as an exhibit within it. Our taking part also strengthens our relationship with the Centre and the investment it has made in SPS.

The dates of the Thomas visits Santa days are: Sat 5, Sun 6, Sat 12, Sun 13, Sat 19, Sun 20, Tue 22, Wed 23 December.

Our tasks mainly include ‘shepherding’ passengers into the right places for their meeting with Santa, helping them on and off the trains and above all being happy, friendly, chatty and giving them fun, enjoyable and memorable day. There are no special skills required, and a full explanation of the tasks required is given by the very friendly co-ordinating team at the beginning of the day.

It is also great fun and a rare treat to see steam locos working in the frost and, if we’re lucky, snowy conditions!

Please give consideration to helping out on one of the days above if you can. They are a great help to the Centre and therefore to Swindon Panel Society. Please contact us to volunteer – it is good fun!

And if you’re really well behaved, you might even get to meet Santa yourself!

Our second annual outing took place in September – to the very splendid RHDR in Kent.

We were treated to the celebrations of the 90th anniversary of the first two locomotives – Green Goddess and Northern Chief – which were delivered to New Romney before the railway was even built in 1925.

We enjoyed private use of the bar car all day. Our host, Sian, was lovely and made us all feel very at-home, including giving us all the news, history and gossip about the line!

The bar had has two seating areas either side of a central bar that has a wide range of drinks and snacks available.
We made two round trips on the line, stopping off at Dungeness at lunch time for a locally-caught fish and chip dinner. We were one of the last customers of the RHDR’s restaurant at Dungeness for the time being as it has now been stripped out and is being enlarged and rebuilt. It is excellent that a restaurant out in the middle of nowhere on a shingle peninsular is commercially sound enough to warrant such a significant investment – a testament to the popularity of the RHDR!

On the way back we alighted at New Romney for a look round the museum and various loco works and attractions that were open for the event. As the bar car was hired by us for the day the whole carriage was taken off the train, with us still inside it, and shunted to a siding next to the restaurant via the loco sidings and over the turntable! (We were propelled over the turntable… maybe they weren’t confident it was lined up!)

The OO gauge layout in the Toy & Model museum is excellent. It is extensive and fully automated, with trains of various geographical origins pulling some extraordinary trains. Also featured of course is the famous OO gauge “Romney Rat” – a toy rat hollowed out and with an electric engine inside and runs around the layout like a train! The museum also has a good collection of other exhibits relating to the RHDR and other railways.

In the afternoon we travelled back to Hythe again in our bar car, to position ourselves for one of the event’s star trains. A non-stop to Dungeness (13 miles), where the train combined with another train, for a non-stop run back to Hythe calling at New Romney only, with FOUR engines on the front!

On arrival at Hythe, and after the spectacle of the engines turning on the large turntable there, the return trip to New Romney was spectacular in a way that very few railways other than the RHDR can manage – a parallel run along the double train section, with the train on the “up” line and three locomotives on the “down” line running along side. This is a really special treat for any steam railway fan – where else can you have a decent sustained view of a driver working his engine or a Walshearts valve gear whirling around at speed?

Thank you to everyone who everyone who came on the trip, we hope you enjoyed yourselves. Suggestions for next year are very welcome (especially if you have “connections” at a centre that can be used!)

The next stand days are the August Bank Holiday weekends at Didcot Railway Centre.

The priority day is Saturday 29th, but if sufficient volunteers are forthcoming we will open on Sunday 30th too!

Please let us know if you can help and we’ll make sure your name is ‘on the door’ – great fun and no special skills required!

Steam trains will be running all weekend and Branch Line signalling in operation. The Black Python Bar will also be open.