Fair weather friends of the Ratty, who love to take a gentle ride on their favourite railway through enthralling Eskdale scenery all the way from Ravenglass to Dalegarth are not aware of the tough work undertaken by the line gang to make this experience safe and possible. The gang gets going when the going gets tough during the increasingly limited periods of time where the railway is closed to traffic for the winter.
Their task for track week 2006 was to relay completely from the top of Walk Mill summit to the 3 3/4 mile post with new rail and sleepers, using new rail that had been delivered the previous winter. Late in November, after the last service train of the season, permanent staff had prepared the track bed by unbolting the track, lifting the rail panels to aid the removal of the old sleepers and elastic spikes, placing the old sleepers and track on the opposite side of the track from the new, and then preparing the track bed by digger.
The next Saturday nine volunteers, three staff and one dog arrived on site to find Shelagh with the p-way train, Perkins, with seven wagons and a big gap in the track ready to be filled. Approximately ten lengths of track panels were put together by a crack team of four, using plates and screws. Work started at the 3 3/4 mile post and progressed towards Ravenglass, fishplate-bolting the rails together on the way. The next step was to ballast and shovel-pack the old and new track as it was completed by the forward team. By the end of Sunday, approximately twelve lengths had been ballasted and shovel-packed, with ballast loading by hand, and there were only three lengths of track panel and the gap to be laid down. The next day the tracks were reunited after rail had been cut to fit to provide a smooth joint from new to old at Walk Mill summit so that the first vehicle could safely pass over the new rail. The honour fell to the hand truck for the generator - the smallest bit of rolling stock in the fleet!
Several trainloads of ballast had to be loaded and transported so that the volunteers and their dog could fill in around the sleepers, and old soil and chippings were used to build up the embankment. If only those passengers knew how much sweat had gone into their pleasant journey!
Our photo shows the line gang in action.