Visit the photo set 2014: Welsh Trains on Flickr.
While we were in Wales, we rode four of the Great Little Trains of Wales. All of these are preserved narrow-gauge steam-powered railways that served the slate industry from 1850 to 1950 or so. Many of the global preservation efforts of old trains can be traced back to the efforts in Wales in the 1950’s and 1960’s to keep these railways from being scrapped.
The four railways we rode were:
On the Llanberis Lake Railway, we rode behind “Elidir“. We used the Welsh Highland Railway to complete a hike we did from Rhyd Ddu to Beddgelert. We photographed both Garrett engines used on the WHR, numbers 138 and 143, earlier in the day when they crossed near Rhyd Ddu and rode behind no 138 back to Rhyd Ddu. On the Ffestiniog, we rode the “David Lloyd George” down from Blaneau Ffestiniog to Porthmadog and the “Earl of Merioneth” back up. Finally, on the Talyllyn, we rode behind the “Tom Rolt“.
Although I knew a lot about Welsh train preservation efforts, I was further impressed that the industrial preservation efforts have also extended to their nineteenth century canal systems and the early iron and coal industries as well. As an engineer, I certainly enjoyed seeing how early engineers like Thomas Telford worked.
