Way back in the days before internet brainwashing was invented, a group of like minded individuals met with a plan to save the rather dilapidated railway known as the Tal-Y-Llyn Railway, conveniently named the same name as the Tal-Y-Llyn lake, which is quite a co-incidence as they both are fairly near to each other!
Now as at the time this railway was the first railway to pass into preservation, so a great many tourists that only had two main tourist attractions in Wales to attend, both opened in 1951, this railway and Snowdonia National Park, along with a few castles they had not finished building yet (And still have not finished though most now have temporary walkways and railings installed until one way they will get the job done before the next big war comes) happened to be the main tourist attractions to head for, which for the Tal-Y-Llyn created a problem. Their railway at the time only had two locos and the first had been so well loved in the past that it was totally worn out and unusable, so their just as old back up loco was all they had, and they hardly had any carriages to take the passengers in either. [If one wants to see what it was like when first preserved, scroll down and look at the third (Oldest) video below].
Fortunately a few years earlier the railway on the other side of the hill known as the Corris Railway had closed, and a station master who was rather fond of the locos and stock from this line had diverted attempts to scrap these lovely things, so when the Tal-Y-Llyn had saved enough pocket money and were ready, they were able to rescue some of these as well! (Due to the one railway being a large enough challenge, it was better to rescue one railway than none at all... Besides, decades later the Corris was to spring back to life with an unbelievable force of enthusiasm in a real perseverance of a "Can do" attitude which has been absolutely amazing, and though I have many a time passed there and even called in the village to use their little public conveniences so have parked right next to their station where they have their lovely traverser, when I was desparate for a wee while traveling through the area, along with attending a model railway exhibition in the past, I have yet to actually travel on their Railway, as it has either been closed, or so busy I decided not to (Crowds can be a bit much, not that I don't like to be amongst happy people enjoying themselves).
Corris is an amazing place sitting itself neatly in a mountainside, twinned with Upper Corris, they both light up the eyes of many a visitor to the area).
Now one may be thinking about the Tal-Y-Llyn which happens to have the two Corris locos... A little delightful railwayin itself that now carries so many delighted passengers, that it has need of most of its locos... (And yes, the original two locos have been back to the Corris on visits as it is not far between the two railways! Actually, many years ago in the days when the two separate lines were being proposed and built, there were hopes that one day they could not only join the two lines, but also in future years join with other narrow gauge lines further south, hence why three railways, the Corris, the Tal-Y-Llyn and the Tal-Y-Bont & Hafan Railways were all built to the same gauge so that if they ever were able to join them up, there would not be any difficulty in doing so. They had also suggested before the Vale Of Rheidol Railway was built, that it to would share the same gauge, but unfortunately, Mr Spooner (Also famous for his work with the Ffestiniog Railway further north) decided to use a narrower gauge as that line had a lot of very sharp curves to negotiate, where using the narrower gauge again would assist it in doing so and mean there would be slightly less work involved in building the line.
[Incidently. Those interested in model railways would be interested to find that in 7mm narrow gauge in 0-16.5 , it scales down to very close to the gauge used on these three lines (2'3") that used the same gauge if one uses 00 (H0) gauge track (16.5mm gauge in this scale). It is actually out by an inch but that is near enough. If one wants to model the narrower Vale of Rheidol Railway (1'11 1/2"), one needs to go for the more specialist gauge of 0-14 (14mm gauge width). If modelling in the smaller scale of 009, this modellers gauge is closer to the three railways listed above. Unfortunately, if one wants to represent the narrower gauges of the V of R and the Ffestiniog etc, one will find it better to just pretend one has the gauge width about right, as the effort involved in reducing the gauge width when one is playing with just over a millimeter or thereabouts... It genuinely is not worth the extra hastle! Just use 009 (9mm) gauge instead!]
But back to these two lines either side of a lovely looking mountain that sits inbetween them!
The Corris Railway has come up with a solution so they don't need to borrow their original locomotives back. They have made brand new ones to the same designs which have also had a few small sensible modifications to make the lives of those who will be working them easier. The first entirely new little locomotive was completed around 5 years ago. The second was completed around a year or two ago.
And... Well. Unless I am mistaken, one railway carriage the Corris once had many years ago ended up being rescued and spent a number of years on the Tal-Y-Llyn, and I for one remember well riding on this unique carriage. The Corris has been busy in making three coaches which are built copying the original design. Some may have been rebuilds using original parts? I am not 100% sure but at least one is a complete new build. Now I maybe wrong here, but I believe the Corris might have had their original coach back from the Tal-Y-Llyn? As I saw one of these new Corris locos pulling a set of four lovely bogie coaches... Now these origional Corris coaches are not exactly original in a sense... As these were origionally pairs of smaller four wheel coaches which were later rebuilt into larger bogie coaches that we see today! History is fascinating if one starts to explore it!
And to add to this, more news yet again... The Tal-Y-Llyn has had at least one brand new railway coach built to match their other Tal-Y-Llyn coaches, and they have either had a second New coach, or they will soon be getting one, and these are being built at Boston Lodge Works on the lovely Ffestiniog Railway, so if I can find it, I will include a view of one of these coaches.
So without further delay, here are some videos I discovered on YouTube. (Don't forget that I am not up to date with these two railways. I only know a bit of general information as I love railways, so I may have made the odd error in my descriptions or my guesswork maybe out, as I admit to be joining the dots a little as to if the Corris coach has returned to Corris, and I am not sure what other locos the Corris has etc...
And what the Tal-Y-Llyn Railway looked like when it was first preserved:
(The gentleman doing the commentary is not pronouncing the Welsh names correctly, but it gives an excellent indication of how run down the old line was when it was rescued. It turns out the previous owner had done his utmost to keep the line going on very little income, as deep down he just knew it should not be closed. This surely has the Hand of God on it, as so many little railways and some much larger have been lost)...
Now as at the time this railway was the first railway to pass into preservation, so a great many tourists that only had two main tourist attractions in Wales to attend, both opened in 1951, this railway and Snowdonia National Park, along with a few castles they had not finished building yet (And still have not finished though most now have temporary walkways and railings installed until one way they will get the job done before the next big war comes) happened to be the main tourist attractions to head for, which for the Tal-Y-Llyn created a problem. Their railway at the time only had two locos and the first had been so well loved in the past that it was totally worn out and unusable, so their just as old back up loco was all they had, and they hardly had any carriages to take the passengers in either. [If one wants to see what it was like when first preserved, scroll down and look at the third (Oldest) video below].
Fortunately a few years earlier the railway on the other side of the hill known as the Corris Railway had closed, and a station master who was rather fond of the locos and stock from this line had diverted attempts to scrap these lovely things, so when the Tal-Y-Llyn had saved enough pocket money and were ready, they were able to rescue some of these as well! (Due to the one railway being a large enough challenge, it was better to rescue one railway than none at all... Besides, decades later the Corris was to spring back to life with an unbelievable force of enthusiasm in a real perseverance of a "Can do" attitude which has been absolutely amazing, and though I have many a time passed there and even called in the village to use their little public conveniences so have parked right next to their station where they have their lovely traverser, when I was desparate for a wee while traveling through the area, along with attending a model railway exhibition in the past, I have yet to actually travel on their Railway, as it has either been closed, or so busy I decided not to (Crowds can be a bit much, not that I don't like to be amongst happy people enjoying themselves).
Corris is an amazing place sitting itself neatly in a mountainside, twinned with Upper Corris, they both light up the eyes of many a visitor to the area).
Now one may be thinking about the Tal-Y-Llyn which happens to have the two Corris locos... A little delightful railwayin itself that now carries so many delighted passengers, that it has need of most of its locos... (And yes, the original two locos have been back to the Corris on visits as it is not far between the two railways! Actually, many years ago in the days when the two separate lines were being proposed and built, there were hopes that one day they could not only join the two lines, but also in future years join with other narrow gauge lines further south, hence why three railways, the Corris, the Tal-Y-Llyn and the Tal-Y-Bont & Hafan Railways were all built to the same gauge so that if they ever were able to join them up, there would not be any difficulty in doing so. They had also suggested before the Vale Of Rheidol Railway was built, that it to would share the same gauge, but unfortunately, Mr Spooner (Also famous for his work with the Ffestiniog Railway further north) decided to use a narrower gauge as that line had a lot of very sharp curves to negotiate, where using the narrower gauge again would assist it in doing so and mean there would be slightly less work involved in building the line.
[Incidently. Those interested in model railways would be interested to find that in 7mm narrow gauge in 0-16.5 , it scales down to very close to the gauge used on these three lines (2'3") that used the same gauge if one uses 00 (H0) gauge track (16.5mm gauge in this scale). It is actually out by an inch but that is near enough. If one wants to model the narrower Vale of Rheidol Railway (1'11 1/2"), one needs to go for the more specialist gauge of 0-14 (14mm gauge width). If modelling in the smaller scale of 009, this modellers gauge is closer to the three railways listed above. Unfortunately, if one wants to represent the narrower gauges of the V of R and the Ffestiniog etc, one will find it better to just pretend one has the gauge width about right, as the effort involved in reducing the gauge width when one is playing with just over a millimeter or thereabouts... It genuinely is not worth the extra hastle! Just use 009 (9mm) gauge instead!]
But back to these two lines either side of a lovely looking mountain that sits inbetween them!
The Corris Railway has come up with a solution so they don't need to borrow their original locomotives back. They have made brand new ones to the same designs which have also had a few small sensible modifications to make the lives of those who will be working them easier. The first entirely new little locomotive was completed around 5 years ago. The second was completed around a year or two ago.
And... Well. Unless I am mistaken, one railway carriage the Corris once had many years ago ended up being rescued and spent a number of years on the Tal-Y-Llyn, and I for one remember well riding on this unique carriage. The Corris has been busy in making three coaches which are built copying the original design. Some may have been rebuilds using original parts? I am not 100% sure but at least one is a complete new build. Now I maybe wrong here, but I believe the Corris might have had their original coach back from the Tal-Y-Llyn? As I saw one of these new Corris locos pulling a set of four lovely bogie coaches... Now these origional Corris coaches are not exactly original in a sense... As these were origionally pairs of smaller four wheel coaches which were later rebuilt into larger bogie coaches that we see today! History is fascinating if one starts to explore it!
And to add to this, more news yet again... The Tal-Y-Llyn has had at least one brand new railway coach built to match their other Tal-Y-Llyn coaches, and they have either had a second New coach, or they will soon be getting one, and these are being built at Boston Lodge Works on the lovely Ffestiniog Railway, so if I can find it, I will include a view of one of these coaches.
So without further delay, here are some videos I discovered on YouTube. (Don't forget that I am not up to date with these two railways. I only know a bit of general information as I love railways, so I may have made the odd error in my descriptions or my guesswork maybe out, as I admit to be joining the dots a little as to if the Corris coach has returned to Corris, and I am not sure what other locos the Corris has etc...
And what the Tal-Y-Llyn Railway looked like when it was first preserved:
(The gentleman doing the commentary is not pronouncing the Welsh names correctly, but it gives an excellent indication of how run down the old line was when it was rescued. It turns out the previous owner had done his utmost to keep the line going on very little income, as deep down he just knew it should not be closed. This surely has the Hand of God on it, as so many little railways and some much larger have been lost)...
