disused railway lines

[michael scuffil]

There's a guy on ebay selling 2 home-produced dvds of a cycle trip from Guildford to Shoreham via Christ's Hospital along the disused railway tracks which were still in use in my day. I bought them for reasons of nostalgia and curiosity. After all, something of interest could be made of this. They have a certain naive charm, I suppose, but technically they are far more amateurish than I expected (I would be ashamed to show them to my friends, if I had made them), and from point of view of content, frankly nerdish.

[Katharine]

There's a guy on ebay selling 2 home-produced dvds of a cycle trip from Guildford to Shoreham via Christ's Hospital along the disused railway tracks which were still in use in my day. I bought them for reasons of nostalgia and curiosity. After all, something of interest could be made of this. They have a certain naive charm, I suppose, but technically they are far more amateurish than I expected (I would be ashamed to show them to my friends, if I had made them), and from point of view of content, frankly nerdish.

Some of the railway fanatics ARE nerds, there are some right rivet counters around the Ffestiniog Railway (not my John - he's very knowledgeable but not nerdish!) I should imagine cycling nerds exist too, so the combination could be mind boggling.

[michael scuffil]

At least he's not a cycling nerd. But the bulk of the film consists of footage of a cycle path, all looking much the same for 90 minutes. He gets very excited when he sees a few bricks among the bushes, and dwells on them for minutes at a time as evidence of a platform or whatever. And we keep getting lines like "We're looking east now... sorry, I mean west" and not once, but many times.

I never actually travelled the Guildford line by train, but I did go to Brighton once or twice this way -- to see the "French Plays" put on in the Pavilion every November.

[Wuppertal]

The walk also featured a mile and a half long tunnel which was quite an experience as it had a bend in the middle so you could see absolutley nothing in front of you. I only did THAT once.

That sounds fantastic! It must have been spooky but exhiliarating, especially if alone.

[jhopgood]

Your tunnel experience sounds similar to what some university friends and I experienced in the Harecastle tunnel in summer 1970.

We hired a cabin cruiser at Market Drayton and ended up one Sunday night at the end of the Harecastle, which was one way and we were too late to go through that evening. Consequently we were first boat the next morning.
Harecastle is about one and a half miles with numbers along the side. We were told that the lowest point was at number 18, but if we could get under the gauge at the start of the tunnel, there would be no problem.
We took down the windscreen, hit the gauge on the way in, through a combination of poor steering and hangovers, and then discovered that a small hand torch was worse than useless in a pitch black environment. Fortunately the boat behind us had rigged up a car lamp so we navigated by that.
It is narrow and the tow path comes and goes. Apparently skippers of the old metal narrow boats just take the funnel down, put it on full bore, go downstairs to have a cup of tea and rattle through.
Not us. Had we been able to turn round and go back we would have done as the tunnel roof scraped our roof at number 8. A combination of not being able to see clearly what is ahead, (the light behind illuminated the tunnel sides but not right ahead), occasional waterfalls, no light at the end of the tunnel until well over half way through and the knowledge that we would get stuck at number 18 made it quite an experience.
The guy in the bar either got the numbering wrong or was trying to put the wind up us as we got through, much to our relief.
Our conclusion was that canal holidays are great, but that a bit of prior research would have been useful. (We just calculated distances from pub to pub).

[Wuppertal]

This thread reminds me of really happy summer afternoons on my Deps and Grecians.

Me and a couple of friends used to go walking on the abandoned railway line south of CH - what is now the Downs Link. It was simple to get out of the school site without being noticed - we'd just get a Horsham pass so anyone would think we were in Horsham, so there was no problem with being not on site.

We used to leave at 2pm and get back for roll call at 7. On the longest walks we did about 20 miles (10 miles in one direction then back the same way). That sounds a lot but when you think about it, the "normal" walking speed is 4 miles an hour and we walked quite a lot more quickly than that anyway, so 20 miles is achievable in an afternoon if you keep a decent pace and don't take too long breaks.

Anyway, this just reminded me of that, and they're fond memories that I haven't thought of for a couple of years. The abandoned railway line (Downs Link) would take us through the disused train stations of Southwater and West Grinstead. There was a tunnel along the route, though not a very long one, maybe 200 metres at a rough guess. By the time it got to about 4:30pm, we had reached the foot of the South Downs and the tall hills were right in front of us, within our grasp, and we were reluctant to turn back but had little choice. I really wanted to get over the top of the downs and then see the Channel laid out in front of us, but we couldn't go that far in the few hours we had.

I don't know what it is, but there is something about warm early summer afternoons in Sussex and CH that evokes all the positivity in my body.

[Wuppertal]

When I lived in Oxford I had a book of historical walks which led me for miles through villages left abandoned by the black death etc. Fascinating discoveries on the way.

Cool, that didn't include The Ridgeway by any chance?

There are some spooky ghost-towns/villages in that forest! It's just off the A34 south of Didcot.

[Wuppertal]

...About 2 miles outside Burford are the remains of a village that was decimated by the Black Death. All that remains are lumps in the ground and a solitary chapel (St Oswalds, I think it's called). However, inside the chapel are numerous well preserved wall paintings dating back to (and documenting the effect of) that particular outbreak. Fascinating stuff.

I lived on the Iffley Road which wasn't too far from the Thames Path. I followed that both to Abingdon (regularly) and to Eynsham (once).

Small world - my dad lives in Eynsham and we walk along the Thames Path on a regular basis. That place near Burford sounds worthy of a look next time I'm there.

[Great Plum]

The old railway lines from Christ's Hospital now form the Downs Link which stretches from the North Downs Way to the South Downs Way - the vast majority of the link is on the old railway lines which makes it excellent for cycling as it is all flat (as I have done once)

The old tunnel is situated near Baynards (this is the only extant station on the line, having been lovingly restored by someone) just north of Rudgwick. However, one end is mostly bricked up and the north end cutting has been completely filled in. It is now used apparently by a large number of bats although it was once used for growing mushrooms!

[michael scuffil]

I've just watched (some of) the other disc, the one between Guildford (actually, the pillbox at Peasmarsh Junction) and CH. Most of it the same exciting footage of a cycle track between hedgerows, taken with a hand-held camera while cycling. However, he does go (not very knowledgeably) into what is apparently a famous dispute about the ownership of the trackbed between Baystone Bridge and CH station (which when he made the film was firmly fenced off, but with lots of notices pinned to trees about public hearings etc.).
And he also has much footage (too much, really) of the old Guildford line section of CH station, now totally overgrown but still there. I found that quite interesting.
What did come as a surprise to me is that CH station itself now looks like I expected it to look in 1955. Back then, on first arriving, I was amazed by its size. Quite apart from the Guildford bit, the main line had platforms that were roofed over, and there was a third platform (for CH special trains, I imagine. I suppose they don't exist any more). But now it's an ordinary country halt, and the forecourt looks quite different. In fact, the old station buildings have all gone. I hadn't realized.

[Great Plum]

The railway station buildings were mostly demolished in 1972 I believe and the where the main station building and the 'CH' platform was tarmaced over to extend the car park...

The island platform building survived to become the only building left - the ticket office is still sometimes open...

The signal box was there until the late 90's when it was burnt down.

There is a gate on the London platform that is normally open that still gives access to the old Guildford platforms that are still there but very overgrown...

[Wuppertal]

There is a gate on the London platform that is normally open that still gives access to the old Guildford platforms that are still there but very overgrown...

That's interesting. When I was at CH from 1998 through to 2005 I always saw that gate but there was always a very fiercely worded sign, "entrance strictly forbidden...do not enter on fear of death by guard dogs and snipers, etc.", so sadly I never plucked up the courage to take a peek at the old station, which I would very much have liked to do just to see what it was like.

[englishangel]

YOu started this thread by saying how nerdy it is and here we are two pages later!!!

[J.R.]

The railway station buildings were mostly demolished in 1972 I believe and the where the main station building and the 'CH' platform was tarmaced over to extend the car park...

The island platform building survived to become the only building left - the ticket office is still sometimes open...

The signal box was there until the late 90's when it was burnt down.

There is a gate on the London platform that is normally open that still gives access to the old Guildford platforms that are still there but very overgrown...

Disgruntled pupils, perchance Plummo ?

[michael scuffil]

The guy who made the film (he calls himself "dumpman") said that access to the Guildford platforms on CH station was fenced off and had lots of no entry signs. He filmed as a trespasser. But apparently this is part of the disputed territory which the local council is/was having hearings about.

Incidentally, are there still CH special trains? Presumably they're needed for St Matthew's Day.