Travels Through History - The North-East of England

By Julian Worker

This is a short travelogue about travelling in the North-East of England and all the history a visitor can see in a very time. Places vary from the large city of Newcastle with its iconic bridges across the River Tyne to smaller gems such as Durham with its magnificent Norman cathedral. Tourists can find Roman ruins in abundance and large, modern sculptures along with lovely market towns, small villages with a Brigadoon feel to them, and vast swathes of open countryside that hasn’t changed since The Romans looked northwards from Hadrian's Wall.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AG Books
• Release date: Jul 16, 2019
• ISBN: 9781789820614

Julian Worker

“Little Known British Traditions” is my first book of humourous stories. One of my stories, Safari Sickness, has been recently published in an anthology called “Leave the Lipstick, Take the Iguana” by Travelers’ Tales. Other articles have recently appeared in the Expeditioner online e-zine, and in Americas the magazine of the Organization of American States. My travel stories have appeared in The Toronto Globe and Mail, The National Catholic Register, International Travel News, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and the Southern Cross newspaper in South Africa. On the Internet my writing has appeared on the following websites: In the Know Traveller, Go World, Paperplates, Intravel, and GoNomad. I have also taken many photographs that have appeared in travel guides/articles by National Geographic, Thomas Cook, The Rough Guides, and The Guardian.

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Travels through History

The North-East of England

Julian Worker

First published in 2019 by

AG Books

www.agbooks.co.uk

Digital edition converted and distributed by

Andrews UK Limited

www.andrewsuk.com

© Copyright 2019 Julian Worker

The right of Julian Worker to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Any person who does so may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

The views and opinions expressed herein belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect those of AG Books or Andrews UK Limited.

Shildon & Darlington - The beginnings of the railway

Shildon was the world’s first railway town. On 27th September 1825 a train ran from Shildon to Stockton via Darlington. The steam engine Locomotion pulled over thirty wagons containing passengers and coal, sometimes together in the same wagon, for 5 hours over a distance of 25 miles. This might seem slow, but there were stoppages on the way. A wagon broke a wheel and was detached from the train. The locomotive needed repairs for 35 minutes. A man fell off one wagon and under the next wagon in line. He broke his foot. Some of the poorer people of Darlington were given gifts of coal at a scheduled stop.

The Locomotion Museum at Shildon is part of the National Railway Museum at York and the Science Museum in London. I first saw it on the left-hand side of the tracks just before Shildon when travelling from Darlington. The list of stations for this service to Bishop Auckland includes Railway Museum, so there’s little excuse to miss the gigantic aircraft-hangar sized building housing the locomotives, carriages, and wagons of the Locomotion Museum. The word Locomotion fills the space under the crescent-shaped roof of the entrance.

Outside the building are various engines and carriages displayed on sidings as though they’re not important enough to be inside. Entrance to Locomotion is free although there is a suggested donation, which I would encourage visitors to pay as it keeps these museums open for all throughout the year.

Inside it’s difficult to know where to start as there are locomotives, carriages, tenders, milk wagons, hoppers, and full-scale replicas of old steam engines lined up on parallel tracks. The most striking feature is the Advanced Passenger Train (APT) placed on a track next to a model of Locomotion. There’s also a beautiful yellow and green replica of the Sans Pareil locomotive. Built by Timothy Hackworth, the original took part in the Rainhill Trials in 1829.

Other highlights of the Locomotion collection include a massive, powder-blue English Electric diesel, a LNER snow-plough, and a Siphon G Waggon first used before WWII for distributing milk churns. It has the immortal words "Shunt