Good evening,

Regular readers might remember that in May 2014, Dave visited the Watercress Line where Britannia had just had her forward driving wheels removed in the Ropley wheel drop. He jokingly called her the “BR Standard Atlantic” and that nickname has stuck.

However after some hard work and elbow grease this week she is no longer an Atlantic and is back to being a Pacific. This is brilliant news for 2 reasons. Firstly it is always great to see locomotives back in action and secondly she is due to star in the Watercress Lines Spring Steam gala in just under a months time.

The Gala will be an exciting event that will not only see ‘Britannia’ return to steam after her time spent at Ropley but will also see the welcome return of ‘Bittern’ back to MHR rails. Bittern arrived back on the Mid Hants yesterday after her short trip down from Southall.  Alongside these two great engines will be the lines popular home fleet: Schools Class No. 925 ‘Cheltenham’, Lord Nelson Class No. 850 ‘Lord Nelson’, West Country Class No. 34007 ‘Wadebridge’, BR Standard Class 9F No. 92212 and Stanier Black 5 No.45379.

With potentially three LocoYard reporters at this one gala I can assure you we will get some good coverage of it.

Thanks for reading