Days Out – the Kent & East Sussex Railway

There’s something about a steam train that makes most of us feel nostalgic – even those of us who were born long after the days of steam, and only remember the rattling diesel boneshakers that were all British Rail seemed to offer in the 1980s.

Tenterden station with one of its more unusual locos

Of course there are all kinds of steam trains.  There was the Mallard – still my favourite – breaker of the speed record, its aerodynamically streamlined design setting it apart from lesser locomotives that still looked like cylindrical tanks with a cab attached. That was a big mainline loco – the power of steam made manifest.

Then there were the little rural lines. Tiny stations serving villages of a scattered few dozen houses. White painted fences and tiny beige waiting rooms. (If you’ve ever read Edward Thomas’s poem Adlestrop yes, it’s just what these stations are like.) Unsurprisingly, come the 1950s and 1960s and Dr Beeching with his axe, most of them were closed.

The Kent & East Sussex Railway is one of these rural branch lines, from Tenterden to Bodiam. It’s a light railway – built to less exacting standards than other lines, which has on occasion led to problems (believe it or not, badgers nearly undermined the line with their digging a few years ago).

The landscape here is one of the main attractions. This isn’t a grand landscape – it’s lush, relaxing, ‘garden of England’, open fields with mature trees and ancient hedges. What my grandfather used to call ‘olde tea shoppe landscape’. (And if it’s an olde tea shoppe you’re after, the K&ESR has a superb refreshment room at the station.)

Then when you get to the end of the line you can visit Bodiam Castle [map], a moated fourteenth century castle of singular beauty. (If you produce your train ticket, you should get a discount on the entrance fee to the castle.)

Railway nuts will have a field day. The K&ESR doesn’t just operate a few steam trains on its 11 miles of track. It’s also home to an assortment of weird and wonderful rolling stock – ex army ‘Austerity’ saddle tank engines, American and Norwegian locos, Victorian one-offs, the railway has an incredible mix.

There’s also a museum focused on the eccentric Colonel Stephens, who founded this and other light railways. He was a business failure – the light railways were a great idea – lower cost railways for local traffic – but they simply couldn’t cut costs low enough to be viable in the long term. But he was a visionary – perhaps a madman – and the museum is most intriguing.

Where: K&ESR, Tenterden Station, Station Road, Tenterden, TN30 6HE [map]

Transport from London: Easiest by car. By public transport, train from London to Ashford, then bus to Tenterden.

Photo by Fairlightworks on flickr