RJS1977

Welcome to the Flying Circus!

 

Hi All,

 

Snakes alive! It's PYTHON time. Actually, it's the second PYTHON I have built. The first one I did, I was never that happy with. What made me less happy with it was dropping it on the floor so I either spent a lot of time fixing up something I wasn't that pleased with or I cut my losses and start again...

It's only a flesh wound...

We've got ex-GWR rail chairs for sale at Wallingford station, £10 each....

Edited to remove a sentence about what I own as I discovered it was a repeat of a previous post I made here a year ago!

 

That would have been quite a trek!

 

 

At the time, the only way of doing it without break of gauge.

Yup - Lilley Bridge Depot.  Technically it was an Underground depot - works trains for surface lines albeit I have seen Tube battery locos in there.  Also the High St Ken - Olympia shuttle used to run only when there were exhibitions at Olympia.  But I think that now there are regular through services travelling between  Clapham Junction and Willesden, the Olympia shuttle is daily. 

Five times a day on weekdays (three between 6am and 8am, then two between 7:30pm and 9pm.

On Saturdays it's every 20 minutes.

However apart from being on the online journey planner and working timetables, TfL make very little effort to publicise this service. The DMI boards at Earl's Court simply read "See front of train" when one is coming in, signs on the platforms advise passengers to get the bus and there are announcements telling people that "there are no trains from this station to Kensington Olympia, please catch the bus," even when the Olympia train is in the platform waiting for passengers!

The L&NWR, and subsequently the LMS, offered tickets to London (Euston) from Swansea; presumably, they didn't go out of their way to tell passengers how long it took.

Indeed, the first through train from London to Pembroke Dock went via Stafford, Crewe, Shrewsbury, then down the Central Wales line to Llandeilo and across to Carmarthen!

I'd better get on and repaint my PECO skip wagons into 'Zorin' livery, and build my 'San Monique Transport' single deck railbus!

Both on view here:

An additional sound effect has been added to the laptop - when the railbus arrives, Sir Roger's voice calls out "All change! End of the line!"

Slightly later than planned, here are my photos from Woodley Carnival:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/53027759@N05/sets/72157684846290196

You mean you weren't at Knowle Hill     (MMDMRC 'summer show' - including two layouts by RMweb members)

Afraid not this year. The Loddon Vale Club had invited me to take my 'Seaside Layout' and a CWR publicity stand to be part of their presence at the Carnival.

Reading that last post has brought on my hayfever!

Lots of nice looking cars on display at Woodley Carnival today. Too tired to upload the photos now (been at the carnival all day), but maybe tomorrow.

I owned several Minis over here in Oz. The earlier versions (the round fronted variety) seemed to be less prone to rust than those which came later (from about 72 all Minis sold under the Leyland Australia banner, had the square type front, I think they were sold as clubmans in the UK) those later versions rusted a lot more but I don't know if they were fully built here or just partially assembled here.

 

As driven by Kylie Minogue in Neighbours!

One episode of Go With Noakes had him digging part of the New Moelwyn Tunnel and training to be a Guard on the Ffestiniog.

Assuming we're talking about the Gauge 1 railway in the model village itself, not the 15" Bekonscot Light Railway, then Gauge 1 is borderline between model and miniature railways. As it's clearly not capable of carrying passengers, I would put it in the 'model' category. And other Gauge 1 railways have featured in RM in the past, though I can't think of any recently. The only real reason I can think of that Bekonscot hasn't had an article in Railway Modeller is maybe nobody has submitted one....

Grrr .... why did ITV and True Entertainment manage to schedule The Spy Who Loved Me and the Persuaders to be on at the same time!

I've just discovered that Roger Moore wasn't the only 007 to pass away this month.

Daliah Lavi, who played 'The Detainer' (one of the multiple James Bond 007s) in the 1967 version of Casino Royale, died on 3 May.

Perhaps Daniel Craig will go to HO heaven?

Craig should be 009 surely?

As I see it, Heathrow would have had to borrow the money to build the Heathrow branch, and that loan is being paid back out of the fares on the Heathrow express and Connect services  (hence their premium prices and not normally accepting Travelcards).

If TfL take over these services, then Heathrow are left with an unpaid loan and which they will not be able to repay unless TfL compensate them in some way.

Thinking back on the timing of the shooting of The Persuaders, I think that George Lazenby got the part of James Bond next, and back to Connery before the first Roger Moore 007 outings, so Tony Curtis knew of an early offer to Moore to play Bond, of which there were rumours at the time, that Moore was approached, but Lazenby was far cheaper!. I was told that Patrick McGoohan was re-approached at the time, but again refused the part as it was to violent for his tastes. He was an original choice before Connery......and Moore had been considered, but was thought a bit "light weight", which in the end turned out to be his main asset.

No, the Persuaders was filmed in 1970-71, and On Her Majesty's Secret Service was released in 1969.

Interesting that Patrick McGoohan thought Bond was too violent - McGoohan murdered more people on Columbo than anybody else!

Another thing - the 'Roger Moore' Facebook page, though obviously run on his behalf rather than by the man himself, had a feature whereby once a month, followers could post questions for Roger, which would be passed on to him, and he would answer the six he found most interesting. That would be a nice touch from any star, but knowing now how ill he must have been recently (the last set of answers he provided was earlier this month IIRC) makes it even more remarkable.

 

This wonderful tale has been 'shared' to me on Facebook. Sums him up perfectly.

 

"As a seven year old in about 1983, in the days before First Class Lounges at airports, I was with my grandad in Nice Airport and saw Roger Moore sitting at the departure gate, reading a paper. I told my granddad I'd just seen James Bond and asked if we could go over so I could get his autograph. My grandad had no idea who James Bond or Roger Moore were, so we walked over and he popped me in front of Roger Moore, with the words "my grandson says you're famous. Can you sign this?"

 

As charming as you'd expect, Roger asks my name and duly signs the back of my plane ticket, a fulsome note full of best wishes. I'm ecstatic, but as we head back to our seats, I glance down at the signature. It's hard to decipher it but it definitely doesn't say 'James Bond'. My grandad looks at it, half figures out it says 'Roger Moore' - I have absolutely no idea who that is, and my hearts sinks. I tell my grandad he's signed it wrong, that he's put someone else's name - so my grandad heads back to Roger Moore, holding the ticket which he's only just signed.

 

I remember staying by our seats and my grandad saying "he says you've signed the wrong name. He says your name is James Bond." Roger Moore's face crinkled up with realisation and he beckoned me over. When I was by his knee, he leant over, looked from side to side, raised an eyebrow and in a hushed voice said to me, "I have to sign my name as 'Roger Moore' because otherwise...Blofeld might find out I was here." He asked me not to tell anyone that I'd just seen James Bond, and he thanked me for keeping his secret. I went back to our seats, my nerves absolutely jangling with delight. My grandad asked me if he'd signed 'James Bond.' No, I said. I'd got it wrong. I was working with James Bond now.

 

Many, many years later, I was working as a scriptwriter on a recording that involved UNICEF, and Roger Moore was doing a piece to camera as an ambassador. He was completely lovely and while the cameramen were setting up, I told him in passing the story of when I met him in Nice Airport. He was happy to hear it, and he had a chuckle and said "Well, I don't remember but I'm glad you got to meet James Bond." So that was lovely.

 

And then he did something so brilliant. After the filming, he walked past me in the corridor, heading out to his car - but as he got level, he paused, looked both ways, raised an eyebrow and in a hushed voice said, "Of course I remember our meeting in Nice. But I didn't say anything in there, because those cameramen - any one of them could be working for Blofeld."

 

I was as delighted at 30 as I had been at 7. What a man. What a tremendous man."

 

I remember reading some years ago that he'd turned up to an airport on one occasion (after he'd retired as Bond) to find his flight had a rather familiar three-digit number...

 The films were a bit silly at that point.

 

Not as silly as they could have been:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDU4HiZwLbk

I'd better get on and repaint my PECO skip wagons into 'Zorin' livery, and build my 'San Monique Transport' single deck railbus!

Apart from Peter Sellers, the only actor to have played both James Bond and (Chief) Inspector Clouseau:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3atzmKqmI_I

I thought it a shame when 'Skyfall' came out that they didn't commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Bond movies by getting Sean, George, Roger, Tim and Pierce all to make cameos (e,g, all sat round one of the tables in the casino) as it was likely to be the last major Bond anniversary when they would all be alive. Sadly that has turned out to be the case.

My first memory of him is the children's series "Ivanhoe"

 

RIP

Too much Saxon violence for my liking...