 Hello, thank you for joining me on this lovely spring Sunday morning. I'm walking through the suburbs of Norwich We're heading to Eaton Park. Today is another episode of Minutes Railway Britain. In today's video We're going to the Norwich and District Model Engineering Society's Minutes Railway at Eaton Park. Now, it's quite a long walk from the city centre It's a good two miles. So if you were to come here by train, I'd probably suggest you take a bus There are plenty of buses that head out in this direction but because it was such a nice morning and I enjoy walking and exploring I thought I would walk to the railway. I did visit this railway a few years ago So it is one I have been to before so I am looking forward to revisiting and seeing it again. The club I understand has existed since 1933 I think so they've been around quite a while, but the railway we're going to see Was first set up there in 1956, but it's extended over the years as these railways do So what we will see today Isn't is quite a lot longer than what would have been there in 1956. That's for Eaton Park Well, that was a park set up by the council of Norwich to give to the people of Norwich You know somewhere to be like I'm today really going to enjoy their Sunday mornings It's quite a vast park. So we will have a bit of a look around the park There's also a boating console. We might see some model boats as well Which will be a nice addition to the minutes railway. So I'm going to continue down this avenue and Soon we shall come to Eaton Park As you can see there are buses that come up to this part of Norwich So if you don't want to do long walk I've just done you can come here by bus or You can drive we're at the park now. This is the entrance. I think to one of the car parks There's a sign there. Tourist sign says Eaton Park East Which practices East gives you an idea of the vastness of the park. It's pretty big Here's the gates into the park and I believe it's at this end where the Minutes Railway is I think as soon as I can get So let this car come past Minutes Railway is just there because I can see a sign. It says Norwich District Society of Model Engineers and the SME Members only so if we come to here Here we are here. Well, here's the racetrack Minutes Railway I don't think it's gonna be running today because you can see there's a gate in it and it's opened So we thought you won't be having a ride on that. What we'll do will follow the racetrack Minutes Railway Down and we'll go and find what we can have a ride. There's a map here of the park So this should give us an idea. Welcome to Eaton Park Norwich City Council We're there. So we've got to go past the Rose Garden and Says Minutes Railway is here. So let's go another look at that. So as I said There is the racetrack So I think the racetrack doesn't really form part of their public running I'm not saying it never does but as we've seen it's not running today, but there it is Track goes off down there. So it probably forms a loop as racetrack finds do This is the Rose Garden quite nice So we've kind of it's sort of them Three rings of different types of trees. You've got a ring of you or you hedge ring. You've got a ring of Holmoaks Which is evergreen oak. I think the Latin name is Kirkazilex and in the middle You've got a ring of cherry trees and they all look really nice with their blossom and you can see the roses If you have to come here at a different time of year, you might not have the cherry blossom But you'd have the roses. So I think that would all look really nice And then as I said behind the new hedge is the racetrack Minutes Railway I believe that's the railway they refer to as their heritage track. That's their original railway track The railway we're going to ride today came later now. Can I look behind that tree? Where those large trees are that building looks very much like a railway station. So I think we're getting close And I can just hear the sound of a diesel engine. So we're definitely not far away The other interesting thing is Before passenger carrying pleasure railways came to Eaton Park. When Eaton Park was built They had a railway, an aerogage railway, which would have been used by contractors to move You know equipment around. I'm not too sure whether there was any locos, but I've seen pictures of it And I've been discovered. I remember this from last time But here, this fence post, it's a bit of the old narrow gauge rail And here's some By the large trees As we come to the racetrack Minutes Railway, there's a station there called Larch End So if we were to ride the racetrack Minutes Railway, we'd catch a train at Larch End There's a couple of diesel locos on their engine shed Another reason why They're not going to be running the racetrack line is if we have a look we get to here Here's the main railway station. This is Parkside And the ground level track actually runs through the racetrack So you physically can't run the two together. So what I'm going to do, I'm going to go over there Just going to have a look to what there is and then we're going to have a ride on the train It's the exciting bit. So here's the station before I get my ticket And there's a diesel locomotive there called Toe of the Tug There's also a warship. So that would be quite cool So I expect we'll have a ride behind one of those locos. Very short I just had a very enjoyable trip behind this warship locomotive. It's number D828 And she's called Magnificent and she's a warship plaster bloke Now, may notice I have gained a high visibility jacket The railway has very kindly given me permission to show you around the arches a bit So we can have a look at some of the other trains that are running. Here goes one of the diesel locos It's a nice little five-inch gauge shunter there So the railway is seven and a quarter inch But as you can see on the Freelac rails, it is also five inch There's the steaming base. It's actually a steam locomotive running Today there's a they do quite often runs There's another diesel locomotive as in an actual Diesel like the one that's just gone out, which we'll see some more of Class 66 and another little diesel shunter. Now what we'll do, we'll go over towards Where the race track railway goes and we'll have a little look around So as I said, we're not going to obviously ride on the race track because The ground level track literally cuts it in two We're going to walk through here and go through here. So you can see the The race track there. So there's that gate. It's quite a music in a way, but that gate opens and Let's the the ground level trains pass through here There's their engine shed There's a couple of diesel locos we saw as we went in That's large end station. So the race track line will go off up there And it goes to the loop we saw as we come into the park and then around here So the the line into the engine shed crosses the main line here On the level on little diamond crossing. So the main track continues off Around there to a tunnel. I think when the ground level track first opened I think it was 1959. It'd been a lot smaller circuit Probably only really a circle not even the longer line that went off Yeah that we saw going Way off down there And then here is where the ground level track once again cuts through the High level track so that gate would close There's the tunnel. So the train we went through the tunnel and then once it's been through the tunnel It goes out of this Area and it crosses the public part of the park and then it's got a nice little field and cherry orchard Which the railway runs through. So we're going to have a quick look over there because there was a couple of bits I wanted to show you over there So if we follow back past the turntable And uh There's our our warship flow code which we rode behind So the tunnel which we passed through which we might even go with the other end of winds its way around to here This is that the tunnel was built in 2013. I understand the ground level line opened in 2006 On this by the way, which we saw in the train. That's where the token is hung up So there's like a single line token for that section So this is where the railway park side leaves the park now while there's not a train here When the trains arrive back at the station Passengers get off at this platform and then the train draws forward to the arrival platforms There goes an announcement If you look there as you can see the track used to have more of a curve So they've altered the track at some point and built it to make a longer platform now It does say no exit here, but Just there it says no exit. I think that's for passengers. I've got the hive is I've got permission to Have a bit of a walk around. I just always have to Every time do the office thing check there's no trains coming. So at this point here The railway line crosses the park. So Trains, you know, we saw that they they have to blow their horns So any visitors to the park are aware The train is literally going to cross Is that a train? I can hear a train in the field section and then it goes Yeah, so a train now Is just coming out a diesel train is just coming out. I think what they do they have to slow right down Possibly stop make sure there really is no one about So you can see he's running quite slowly He's he's actually stopped He blows his horn and then we can now proceed across the park Back to the railway section. That's what's going to go by and we're going to look in the field So as the diesel locomotive runs along into the station We're walking down here now. It was quite exciting the field section because What effectively happened? It sort of did too How can I put this it sort of did two sort of loops like that but kind of Very close to each other. I might be able to explain that better I sold over crossing gates. We followed the railway line into here. As I said, I have been given permission to do this You come into here. It seems you can just see Track wherever you look This line here is one of two bits of track that's not part of the Ride you travel on so The train would run up there When it gets the end it turns back comes down here goes around there And then there's a smaller loop and then back out So this this section of line is if they ever needed to overtake another train or should the locomotive fail Which is unlikely so you could potentially put a train down there. It's really nice up here quite nice that there's Yeah, just me now as not even any trains would I would like to see a train Is there long straight track I expect those diesels can open up what I'll do when I've um Finished this I'll I'll do some we'll do some line siding So I'll do some around the yard in the station area. We'll also do some line siding up here. Look at this This is really cool He's just got three tracks all running next to each other quite cool if you get it so you've got trains on all of them. So When you when we're on the ride first, we're on that one. They were on the middle one Then we're on the outer one, but is effectively the same track The other thing I want to show you while we're up this end of the site is the other spur Which the passenger trains don't travel on Not often I sort of walk up the middle of three tracks all running parallel To walk past. Yes, that is past these willow trees here and um The the top loop goes around this little hill here Before running down there and then what you see there. That's the The second loop that's not such a large loop. Yes. So here here is the other section of railway line Which we don't travel on so from this junction here to that junction there. So that would be like another shortcut From this hill we get a bit of a view of some of the rest of the park So it's meant to be where is a park for everyone. We can see there's tennis courts over there and over there I think there's a restaurant here And um, we can see this we're going to have a proper look, but we might just be able to see this from here There's some ponds. I think this is where I'm just frightened the birds Yeah, look, there's a boat out in the pond So you can bring I think or there's a model boat club They bring their remote control boats here and they film their boats But we'll we'll go and have a look at that after we've had another look at the railway I want to do some line siding so I'm going to wander back to the station and we'll watch some trains Another great time here at the Eaton Park miniature railway I think it was one of the diesels off on another trip now before we leave the park We're just going to have a look at a couple of the other things there are to see here So as I mentioned when we were up on that mound, there is a large boating pool now Here here is the boating pool It looks like there are some boats. I can see some little yachts over this. What we'll do We'll just walk around here and we'll see if we can see some of those in action And then we'll go over to the center of the park over there. I think there's a restaurant And possibly a bandstand. So it's one of those places, you know, you can easily come and spend a day Quite a lot to see. There's also the vastness of the park if you just fancy a walk And look, there's a speedboat doing this Look how cool that speedboat is, speeding around More interesting track, but that does look pretty cool. It's quite nicely got a long pond like this that they can really That is something a bit difficult, you know, places I go do come across model boating Clubs like this, but they have always been interested in model trains And in its railways, but that's pretty cool Anyway, let's go and have a look at this upper part of the park And then I've got my walk back to Norwich City Centre. I might get a bus, but Yeah, it's nice day, so I'm quite happy to walk. I do enjoy walking There's another pond down here. This pond looks a bit more A bit quieter and it's got instead of having model boats Another few ducks on it I wonder if there's any fish in the pond Can't see any, but doesn't mean there isn't any So as I mentioned earlier, there'd been an aerogate railway It would have been when they built all of this to create the landscape I'm not so sure what kind of traction they'd use. They may have just pushed The wagons by hand or used horses. So it doesn't necessarily mean there are any locomotives It was quite common, you know, to have a contractor's narrow gauge railway, a temporary narrow gauge railway And there's just been little tub wagons, you know, they could have tipped out the spoil So I can imagine there probably were narrow gauge railways around here, but Never meant to be a feature, but it's nice that we have now the miniature railway That's looking down across the water And then this is like the main centrepiece So you've got a restaurant and toilets in there And you've got all of this area here So I hope you enjoyed this video If you'd like to come and visit, they do run the miniature railway runs most Sundays The park, of course, is open all the time They sometimes run these pop-up trains. If they've got enough volunteers, they will just come and run the railway So, you know, do and come and visit them. If you have a look on their website or facebook page You'll be able to see when they're running. So thank you very much for watching Please do feel free to like, subscribe and comment And from Eaton Park in Norwich