Monday 20 December 2010

Stewarding the Santa's at Shackerstone...

Hi all. Now, from time to time, I will occasionally be dragged away from the Steam Department at Shackerstone to do something a little more "commercial" as it were. Today was one of those days! This week, rather than serving on the Bar as I did a few weeks back, I was stewarding one of the BR Mk1 coaches. This involves welcoming guests, seating them, serving everyone drinks, serving everyone mince pies and the children biscuits, answering questions, continuously tidying the coach, helping with other on-train tasks, saying goodbye to the guests and helping them off the train, cleaning out the coach AND readying it for the next people! (This is not to mention everything else that crops up in between!). Roughly, I had 64 people to look after over 4 departures lasting around 90 minutes each. The day's locomotive was the beautiful B1 No1306 "Mayflower". It was a very frosty day indeed and I arrived at Shackerstone on a crisp driveway at 9am. After the days work, I eventually left Shack at 7pm sharp; what a long day! During the day, on the Midday train, fellow CMES member Peter was in our coach for a trip with his family. Peter kindly sent in the three photographs seen in this post. Thank you! Below, I rush back through the coach to the Steward's end...
Below, myself and my 'Manager' I suppose, also Sam, give out Mince Pies on the Buffet Car (see what I mean, in between everything else!!)...
Thanks very much for reading folks. I was due to travel up to Evesham for a day on the 15" gauge railway on Tuesday but, by the looks of it, we're snowed off! Look out for a final pre-Christmas post coming this week. Best Regards, Sam...

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