St Patrick's Athletic v Sligo Rovers
I used to go over to Ireland a lot for the locos they have their, mainly the GM imports. These have now all gone, so it is now usually an annual pilgrimage for an 071 rail tour. This year, it was a weekend tour in April, and was to celebrate 40 years since the introduction of the first 071 locomotive, which kindly coincided with an evening game in Dublin.
My outward move was on the Thursday evening, getting Arriva Trains Wales Y Gerallt Gymro (Gerald of Wales) premier service. Supposedly, this is for the many business people in North Wales who want to travel to Cardiff, but its southbound morning departure and afternoon return, seemed to be ideally timed for Welsh Assembly meetings, who also fund the enhanced service. I'm sure this is just coincidence, as one thing politics isn't is self serving. The reason for choosing this was firstly it is loco hauled...
...and secondly, it is the the only one of their trains to have first class, so you get a full complementary meal on it. Predictably enough, it was full of Assembly Members.
Passing up through Abergavenny, the sun was just starting to poke through after an almighty down pour.
Three hours later, we rounded into Chester.
This was my location for the evening and I alighted, with
67001 getting admiring glances off the locals.
The evening was spent clearing the GBG Cross Keys, Old Harker, and the Cellar. There is another loco hauled set ATW use, this being a bog standard set of mk3s on North Wales services into Manchester. A leisurely start the next morning saw the next in class 67002, on the 1052 service off Chester.
This took us on a fairly uneventful run through to Holyhead, where we landed in the back platform.
I was joined by my companions who arrived a Voyager up from London.
It was then the ferry across to Dublin Port, where we were our bus into town was delayed by an argument between a French Tourist, and the Polish bus driver, who wanted to pay the Irish bus fare in British pounds, and wouldn't accept a 1 to 1 exchange rate. Just you wait until Brexit happens, and you'll be glad to get that. After clearing the seasonal offerings at the JW Sweetman's brew pub in the centre, I headed onto the Luas up to Goldenbridge.
The stop is right next to the Grand canal. It is fair to say not many visitors to Dublin choose to take in the sights of Inchicore.
I'd arrived a couple of minutes after kick off, with the place in apparent lock down.
But eventually a means of entry was found.
St Patrick's Athletic 1 v Sligo Rovers 1, SSE Airtricity League Premier Division
St Patrick's were formed in 1929, originally in the Phoenix Park area but moving to their current location a year later. They played in the Leinster League, but after winning it four successive times, by the 1950s, had progressed to the League of Ireland. The success continued, winning that three times in the decade. However, there were lean times until the back end of the 1980s, when a Brian Kerr led side won the league. However, the club was in financial strife and had to leave Richmond Park. It's return three years later also saw a run of four titles in nine years.
Sligo Rovers were founded in 1928, quickly joining the "Free State League", which they won in 1936. This was followed by a long drought, including dropping out of the league. By the 1970s they had returned, adding another championship. They then went into strife again, dropping down a league. The 1990s saw them return to the top division and giving starts to the mangerial careers of Lawrie Sanchez and Steve Cotterill. This century has seen another league title and three Irish cups.
The busiest area was the main stand, primarily as it was the only cover.
On the opposite touchline is a narrow open terrace, wedged up against the river Camac which runs behind.
Behind the near goal was a bank of sparsely populated open seating.
What the ground was crying out for was a large covered terrace. Well, such as this one behind the far goal. However, it remained off limits.
The cramped nature of the ground meant a myriad of walkways, which were equally popular viewing points.
With some taking it to the extreme.
A half time visit to the bogs revealed some more artwork.
The burden of having inflicted Curtis Flemming on the football world.
Why do toilet cisterns attract so many ultra's stickers?
The standard of the football was surprising, in that it made Scottish football seem competent. Sligo scored from the rebound of a saved free kick.
St Pat's equalised in the second half.
An awful game finished 1-1.
It was back to the Luas for my hotel, which was somewhere out in the mountains.
The next morning and a bus back to Red Cow, which is also the Luas depot, with a rare day light appearance for the works gronk.
Because Ireland has no major coal deposits, it was a very early adopter of diesel trains to replace steam engines. However, they made the mistake of buying early british locos, from Metro-Vic with Crossley engines. These were a complete bag of shit, so were replaced with proven General Motors locos. The pinnacle of these were the 21 class 071 locos that arrived in 1976, to work the inter city services, expecially on the Dublin-Cork.
The rest of the trip was a railtour to commemorate the 40th anniversary of their introduction into traffic.
Heading out of Dublin, and passing Croake Park, the only ground I have seen two Reading players score in the same international game. Sat on the left is Jacko, the bullshitting champion of Gwent who has been name checked a few times in other reports.
All 21 of the class are still in service, despite having been replaced by railcars on passenger services. The newer class 201 locos having been withdrawn instead.
At Ballybrophy, the train had to run round to access the Nenagh branch. Here the social elite watch proceedings from the platform.
Onwards into Limerick (Colbert). 083 had been repainted from the traditional orange and black livery into this silver and gloss back mixed traffic livery.
Dropping on the other end was 076. On the right is Limerick FCs ground.
On to Cork Kent. This loco is in a horrendously drab grey which has replaced the silver and black, but looks like it is still in primer.
Final stop of the day was a jaunt across to our overnight destination of Killarney, accompanied by a good selection of O'Hara's and Crafty Divils from the bar coach.
The next morning, it was back to the station. Trains previously used the steam from engines to heat the trains. When diesels started to appear, they had to have a separate boiler to provide steam to heat the trains. Nowadays, it is all electric heating, but this historic stock is still steam heated, with it steaming nicely.
We headed on up to Tralee, the line in the foreground used to carry on to Limerick.
Despite it being April, we suddenly were inflicted by a blizzard. This is the hillsides of Millstreet, where the 1993 Eurovision Song Contest was held, won of course by Italy's Enrico Ruggeri with Sole d'Europa.
We progressed across to Waterford, now severely rationalised since the line to Rosslare was closed a couple of years ago.
We'd picked up another loco, 077, also in the drab grey livery, seen here at Kilkenny. The 071s made such an impression on Tito, he bought four to haul his personal train around Yugoslavia.
The final loco of the day, 079 dropping on during the reversal at Kilkenny, awaiting the road for the single line from Muine Bheag.
After a night back in Dublin, it was the morning ferry back to Holyhead, for the lunctime loco hauled run back along the North Wales coast.
We bayed fairwell to it at Chester, for a move back down south via Brum.
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