The Dalescroft Railfans

[alcazar]

I'm not sure this is the right place for this topic, but after reading a few "On this day in history" topics, I was reminded of the Dalescroft Railfans.

 

My first trip with them was when I was at college in Nottingham, a mate took me to Nottingham station and the bus picked me up at midnight.

 

At about 5am, it stopped, the lights came on, and someone shouted, "Aberbeeg, everybody out!" We stood in the freezing morning, still pitch dark, as a couple of intrepid, (mad?), lads climbed down the enormous bank and came back with the numbers of the three 37's and the 08 stabled there.

 

The day progressed much the same. I think I virtually cleared my S. Wales shunters in one trip! We finally finished by going round Severn Tunnel Junction in pitch dark with one of the lads holding a LIGHTER under loco numbers so we could see them! I was dropped off in Nottingham and walked back to Clifton around 1am.

 

They also did, "Join us on the day," trips around works, I did Derby, Crewe and Doncaster with them. And you got a monthly printed sheet with full details of every trip, showing every loco seen, on it, as well as details of forthcoming trips. Magic.

 

Anyone else a member and what memories do you have?

[AberdeenBill]

Sigh... Circa 1972, an overnight journey with Dalescroft to the Midlands from the Bournemouth area. Our first 5am-pitch-darkness stop was Stourbridge Junction (I'd never even heard of it LOL). At Burton (on Trent) there was an apparent mix up over the permit and the Shedmaster refused to let us around. While we argued, one of party sneaked around anyway and noted an amazing number of 20s -- as we drove on to Derby, we debated whether we had all "really" seen all the locos... Derby Works and Toton accounted for all the class 44s and we saw over 100 class 20s on the day. Back home at midnight and off to school the next day

 

Bill

[Mallard60022]

Sigh... Circa 1972, an overnight journey with Dalescroft to the Midlands from the Bournemouth area. Our first 5am-pitch-darkness stop was Stourbridge Junction (I'd never even heard of it LOL). At Burton (on Trent) there was an apparent mix up over the permit and the Shedmaster refused to let us around. While we argued, one of party sneaked around anyway and noted an amazing number of 20s -- as we drove on to Derby, we debated whether we had all "really" seen all the locos... Derby Works and Toton accounted for all the class 44s and we saw over 100 class 20s on the day. Back home at midnight and off to school the next day

 

Bill

 

Did Dalsecroft become the Inter City Railway Society? If so, I was a member of Dalescroft and then the ICRS for many years and 'enjoyed' (not really a good descriptive verb) many shed bashing marathon trips. I think I'm still recovering from the Scotland tours.

36E

[alcazar]

My South Wales bash was a culture shock. I'd done a few bus trips as a lad to steam depots, and lost interest at the demise of steam, but a "Merrymaker" Mystery Tour outing in ealy 1973 from Gainsborough to Weston-Super-Mare resulted in four of us starting all over again, mainly spurred on by the renumbering that was going on........oh, and the Westerns.

 

While the rest of the trainload of trippers spent the day in Weston, we went back to Bristol and were refused entry at Bath Road, (No, you can't go round the shed, **** off!" was what we were told, before we even got chance to ASK:(, so we spent the day on Temple Meads station.

 

From then, spotting was "nice": we used binoculars, drove around in our cars, and asked at every shed. THEN I joined Dalescroft............

[Rivercider]

Bringing a thread back from the dead....

I was a member of Dalescroft in the 1970s for a few years.

 

Looking through my small collection of instmatic photos I have some from a Dalescroft trip,

a week long trip in 1975 with a Scottish rover ticket to try and cover every passenger line on the ScR, (we failed).

 

Trying to reconcile the details on the back of the photos is difficult due to my poor note keeping during the trip!

 

Probably 26033 at Inverness, probably going to Kyle of Lochalsh, 4/8/75, probably

 

cheers

 

[John Tomlinson]

Did Dalsecroft become the Inter City Railway Society? If so, I was a member of Dalescroft and then the ICRS for many years and 'enjoyed' (not really a good descriptive verb) many shed bashing marathon trips. I think I'm still recovering from the Scotland tours.

36E

 

Just read this thread, albeit 8 years too late!

 

The answer is no, to my knowledge. Dalescroft was formed by the great character Dale W. Fickes, and the name comes from that of his house, in turn derived from Dale's Croft (old English for habitation?).

 

I last met Mr Fickes on someone else's tour to the eastern Ukraine in 2010, when he was still running his society but then offering foreign trips. I don't know what's happened to him since.

 

If IIRC, the Inter City Railway Society was run by another great character, Dave Slater, and at some point he passed it over to John & Simon Castle. I haven't seen them for a year or two, but they used to go around together (being brothers) doing lineside photography in Britain.

 

John.

[br2975]

Many of us from South Wales were with the Cardiff and Avonside Railway Society.

.

Weekends became a blur, Saturday on Cardiff Gen/Cent then Cardiff City, then a few pints and onto the coach about midnight......first stop, usually Stourbridge Jct if going north.