National gathering of railway staff for Mini Gala event

The mini gala celebrated the “La’al Locomotives at La’al Ratty”. Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway marked the occasion over the weekend of Saturday 5 and Sunday 6 November marking 59 years after a similar gathering in 1963.

Two specially constructed locomotives from the Whistlestop Valley’s Kirklees Light Railway in West Yorkshire - tank engines ‘Fox’ and ‘Badger’ - were the star attractions at this weekend’s event. 

All these locomotives are very different from the regular services that run on Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway. Fox and Badger both have many features that were developed from modern steam ideas advocated by the famous Argentinian engineer L D Porta. 

Fox, departing the railway (Image: Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway)

As well as Fox, Badger and Katie, other heritage locomotives travelling over the weekend included River Irt, River Mite, River Esk and Whillan Beck.

Stuart Ross, General Manager for Visitor Experience, added:

“The heritage railway industry is a major contributor to the British tourism economy and thrives on cooperation between different organisations. It was a superb weekend meeting colleagues from across the narrow gauge world."

"It was a good opportunity to showcase some of our new additions such as our Director Saloon “Ruth”. Not only that, the visiting engines and “Katie” put in some very impressive performances and certainly won the hearts of our visitors”.

Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway driver Phil Brown was very impressed with the visiting engines. He said:

“There is clearly a lot of thought gone into the Kirklees engines. They were both very smooth and efficient at getting the trains up our challenging railway. Very impressed indeed.”

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