Gelert goes to Beddgelert

Despite the gale force wind and the torrential rain, fourteen hour power cut and so on I hauled my carcas out of bed and made my way to Port this morning. The first thing I did was to fit the camera's rain coat and then mine. With Andrew Thomas I drove to Gelert's Farm just in time to see Lyd with some bogie wagons and a couple of vans rattle over Cae Pawb crossing. I just got the camera set up and got a rather dark bit of video of it. It didn't make the final edit but here it is, just for you.

After that we boarded a WHHR train headed by Gelert and set off for Pont Croesor once we had the token. There was a brief pause at Pen-y-Mount junction while the points were unclamped and re clamped behind us and then we were off to Pont Croesor. The heavy rain continued to fall making shooting difficult as I spent more time cleaning the lens than videoing through it.

The token was exchanged and we set off for Beddgelert. We had a brief pause at Nantmor for a crew briefing on what to do in the long tunnel if the train slipped to a halt and then we were off. Gelert started the train away on the wet 1 in 40 with no bother and rattled through the tunnel with only a brief wheel slip mid way.

We had to wait in the pass for a short while as Jon Whalley the F&WHR chief engineer was joining us by road at Bryn y Felin. The tests concerned the couplings and the tight curves on the WHR. You can see that the footpath beside the line was completely underwater at this point.

Once the tests were completed succesfully we moved off and steamed into Beddgelert station in fine style. This was the furthest that a WHHR train had been on the rebuilt line and hopefully it will mark the beginning of more trains run in better weather. Here is the full trip.

Season's Greetings

Just a quick post to say that I hope you have a merry Christmas and that Father Christmas brings you something nice.

I'll be back in the new year with lots of exciting video projects which you will be the first to hear about.

Ho Ho Ho



Festshopman

Ho Ho Ho

Yesterday I spent the day on the Welsh Highland photographing the Santa Trains. Starting at Dinas first thing I then went down to Caernarfon by car to see the train arrive and then went off to Waunfawr to get the arrival.

Once the train arrived I got some nice Santa with people on the platform shots. Next I borded the train and went down to Caernarfon once more shooting the action towards the end of the trip, unfortunately the temperature difference between carriages meant that while I videod Santa and his gang at work the lens steamed up thus rendering the footage un usable which was a shame as it was good otherwise.

I stayed on the train for the up trip and got all I needed to off Santa giving gifts etc and some nice out the window shots.

Once back at Waufawr I tok a few more on the platform shots and then shot the departure from the footbridge. Then I jumped in the car and shot back down to Dinas where the train was just arriving as I pulled into the yard. I boarded the train and re shot the steamed up shot from before.

I rode back up to Dinas on the third train of the day and left the party there as the light was starting to go by then.

This morning I've edited a package together which you can see here. I had about 45 mins of footage which has chopped down to about 7 on screen. HO HO HO....

Up the hill

I took a trip up the FR this week in the lovely winter sunshine. Sometimes it's worth just waving the camera about when the light is as beautiful as it was. I did it the right day as the rest of the week has been foul.

This is what I did with it, very quick edit but you get the idea.

I've also been working on 'Fred - The moovie' as it's still called at the moment. I've put out a request for pictures and film to add into the project and had some success already including some very nice pics of Fred as a child and as lad train spotting.

Once upon a time...

I was just having a clear up on my PC and came accross a video I made in 2004. It is of the WHR from the train, I shot it on my digital compact camera which only had 128mg of memory so I had to do it bit by bit. I was the trolley Dolly on the WHR for a couple of years and so I was travelling on the train every day.

It's the first video I made and have set the pictures to 'Steam' by Peter Gabriel. Apart from the camera and software improving a bit it show how things have changed on the WHR too.