© Geoff’s Rail Diaries 2012 In March 2011, we had a week or so of unbroken blue skies - up to the day of the Statfold open day, when it was grey, dull and misty. Can’t happen again, can it? March 2012 - need I say more (a light drizzle, early in the day, took the place of last year’s mist)? Last year I also visited Statfold for the June event - and arrived to find the big Mallet “Djatibarang No 9” derailed at the bottom end of the station. Within an hour of arriving for this event, the locomotive was off the rails at the same spot. Déjà vu! Once again, nothing could leave the station or the shed yard - the two locomotives out in the fields began to operate an impromptu shuttle, topping and tailing a set of coaches. It looked like it might take a little while to put things in order - now would be a good time to check out the garden railway and the shed at Oak Tree Halt, where I’d seen a new set of points leading off the main line. What was that all about? Two small internal combustion locos trundled around the garden - a Hunslet diesel and a curious Nemeth-built Lister petrol engine-based machine. Oak Tree Shed was a real eye-opener. What is in effect a multi- gauge roundhouse now occupies one corner of the building, complete with turntable bearing the legend “STATFOLD WORKS 2012”. 2’ gauge Peckett “Triassic” (1270 of 1911) sat proudly in the centre, amid an assortment of motive power in varying states of restoration-readiness. By the time we’d finished in the shed, things had begun to operate normally again. The re-railed Mallet had retired, hurt - but there were twelve other locomotives in steam. Yes, thirteen this year - amazing, and pretty tricky to count them all (they kept moving around!). It was only when I’d been working through the photos at home that I realised the total had been so high - I (and my colleagues) were reasonably sure it was twelve. There were only eleven in the final cavalcade (what fun!) and grand whistle-blowing event to mark the end of the event. I’d seen “Jack Lane” in the running shed, apparently not in steam, towards the end of the day, and he wasn’t in the cavalcade - perhaps he too was incapacitated - but there he was, out in the fields, in the photos I’d taken earlier in the day. The thirteen (in no particular order) were: • Trangkil No. 4 - HE 3902 of 1971 • "Statfold" - HE 3903 of 2005 • "Jack Lane" - HE 3904 of 2006 • "Harrogate" Peckett 2050 of 1944 • Sragi No.1 - Krauss 4045 of 1899 • Sragi No 14 "Max" - O&K 10750 of 1923 • Pakis Baru 1 - O&K 614 of 1900 • Pakis Baru 5 - O&K 1473 of 1905 • "Saccharine" - Fowler 13355 of 1914 • SF Djatibarang No 9 Jung Mallet 4878 of 1930 • Isibutu - Bagnall 4-4-0T 2820 of 1945 • Hudswell Clarke 1643 of 1930 • "Howard" - Jung 3175 of 1921 The last two mentioned were, for me, newcomers in steam. The Hudswell Clarke is better known as “Bronllwyd” - but now bears a “Surrey County Council Highways Department” livery - a reminder of its pre- Penrhyn existence. “Howard” was present last June, not quite finished... Despite the weather (inevitably, the following day was bright and sunny), it had been another excellent day. Statfold just gets better and better!   Link: Statfold Barn Railway official website