And so it begins! The Stafford exhibition begins my model railway show expeditions for this year. Stafford is always one of my favourite events and I have been looking forward to it for a couple of weeks now. It always promises to be a big event with three halls packed full of impressive layouts and trade stands.In many ways it did not disappoint again this year. There were many large and impressive layouts to view. Just a shame my digital camera has decided to have a mood and won't let me download my images from the day.

Having arrived, just after 10.30, my father and I spent a good 5 hours looking around the halls. Amongst the exhibits were some old favourites. These included "Romley Midland" which features a regular procession of trains to and from its small terminus station as well as trains from the colliery branch. This enters the line from a fiddle yard at the rear of the layout. There is always plenty to see. The scenics are excellent, although everything does seem a little too clean and perhaps the layout would benefit from more weathered stock - just a personal opinion though. The layout was up for sale and I am sure it will give its new owner many hours of pleasure.

Poole in Wharfedale is another layout I have seen before. It featured at the Derby show last year. This is a lovely through station on a Yorkshire line with a wonderful scenic station, regular traffic and the added action of a working road way across the rear which adds to the scene. This was one of my favourite layouts in the show. Well done to Tim Couling and Harvey Whitmore for an excellent model.

Another familiar model was Mike Kelly's B.R blue era OO gauge layout - "Everbury". I have seen three layouts built by Mike - Cromer, North Bridge and Everbury. All are excellent. He has great skill in adding little cameos and set pieces to the scenics to keep you interested - and there is always a train moving too. I tried to get Mike to bring a layout to my Weston on Trent show last year. Sadly he was away. Maybe I will have better luck this time around! Despite not being a diesel fan - I liked Everbury and spent quite a while watching the action.

Everbury did seem to be part of a theme running through the Stafford show this year. One criticism I have of the event is that it seemed to be "top heavy" with diesel layouts. Not being a diesel fan this was disappointing, but I am sure that the modern image fans had a great day.

Now I do enjoy some modern image / diesel layouts and I admired some of the many such layouts on show. Grange over Sands was another excellent model. Lots of detail was packed into this N gauge model, and my father was able to vouch for the authenticity of parts of the layout. The search and rescue helicopter "hovering" over the coast was a nice touch, as was the camera hidden away in a diesel which transmitted images of passing trains to an adjacent screen.

Loch Tat was another excellent N gauge diesel model. I have seen it several times and it always brings memories of my honeymoon in Scotland a couple of years ago. The Loch itself is beautifully modelled, and the boat is very similar to one I photographed on Loch Linnhe during my stay. This layout won the best in show award. Congratulations to Adrian Lambourne.

Of the "steam era" layouts I enjoyed the North of England line in N gauge. This featured in a recent issue of the Hornby magazine so it was great to see it in the flesh. Lots of scenic detail and set pieces in this layout too!

The Lancashire and Yorkshire based "Calderwood" was another finely detailed model. This was also seen at Derby last year. I was pleased to see a lot more action taking place on the layout this time around and it was much more enjoyable to view as a result.

Another excellent layout was the narrow gauge based "That Damn Railway". This depicted the building of a dam in Wales around the turn of the last century. There was a massive dam wall, with working cranes on the top, a narrow gauge line which zig zagged up the hill and lots of action on the steep gradients. The scenics were superb, with an excellent depiction of the worker's village. In my opinion this was the pick of the show.

Two other layouts stood out for me. Firstly St George's Quay. This O gauge model was extremely detailed and included a working depiction of the coal being loaded into the waiting boats.

Secondly was the "Somewhere in Belgium" model. Ted McElroy's shunting layout had lots of First World War detail. Now many people turn their noses up at shunting layouts, especially the "shunting puzzle" type. Here the operator worked to sequence five of the wagons onto the number 1 road in the order given on printed cards. I have tried something similar on parts of my home based layout and have thoroughly enjoyed it. Whilst watching the operator I was trying to second guess his moves.... I reckon I may have solved the puzzle quicker than he did...but then again, maybe not!

All in all an excellent day out. I managed to pick up some Langley models stuff for my own exhibition layout. I can't wait for the chance to add them to Skaleby West later this week.

Well done to all who organised the Stafford 2013 event. I did enjoy it. Can we have a few more steam, and less diesel layouts next year though!