Post by Dave on Oct 12, 2010 10:43:32 GMT
Torrington Station To Bideford Station Monday 11th October 2010
I have wanted to do the five and a half mile walk from Torrington Station to Bideford Station along the old railway line for some time now and while we planned to do it on Monday, due to how Carol was I wanted to cancel the walk as I felt it was asking to much of her as she was racked in pain and health wise things are not so good for her right now and the reason she will be under going more scans very soon to see if there are other problems that we and the consultants need to know about.
But in the true fighting mode and I’m not going to give in and let it win mentality, that sums up the person Carol is, she convinced me she would be fine and that we should stick to our plans and just go for it and deal with anything we might need to if and when it happened.
So we ended up leaving home a bit later than we had planned and set off to North Devon, the original plan had been to park our car in the Puffing Billy pub car park (old Torrington station) and walk the line to Bideford and then catch a bus back to Torrington. After talking to some people up there last week It was unclear if the pub landlord liked people just leaving their car in his car park and so giving the matter some thought, I decided it would be better anyway to park in Bideford and catch a bus to Torrington as we would be walking back to where are car was and that made far more sense.
I had also last week checked out the best place to leave the car all day in Bideford and as there are so many residential only parking areas I was informed I would be best to park in the long stay car park at the end of the quay. The long stay part of the car park comes after all the short stay places and therefore a longer walk back to the quay area, but at only £2.50 for the whole day feeding the coins into the meter brought a smile to my face and reminded me of the rip-off it is to park in Torbay.
There are three bus operators fighting for trade in North Devon, First, Stagecoach and one private operator whose name I have forgotten for now and on the quay you see bus after bus pulling up at the bus stops, but most are only going to Barnstaple and in total Stagecoach and First only run six buses to Torrington per a day and they are two hours apart and what was a bit maddening to discover was their service to Torrington is only five minutes apart and so there is always two hours to wait for the next bus.
So we had a good hour and a half to kill in Bideford before we could get a bus to Torrington and I was over the moon to come across the most wonderful street I have never seen before ever knew existed. I’m in Bideford twice a week and either leave the town by going over the old bridge (if I have to call on Jewson’s over that side of the river) or drive along the quay and out of the town that way over the new bridge to get to Barnstaple. When you drive along the quay you see a number of streets going up the hillside so to speak, but this magic street we found runs parallel to the road along the quay and I will do a separate Bideford report with pictures later
I also for the first time saw the Finepix SH10 in the flesh and will give my views on it on the camera thread but it made me wonder how small shop keepers can sell such items as the camera was being offered at a special price with over £50 off at £359 and checking today I have found it can be bought on line for £264 so you would have to have more money than sense to buy it from a small retailer.
We found a nice little bakers shop and bought some food and headed back to the quayside to eat it and wait for the no 70 bus as a bus driver working for the private company had told us that was the one we needed to catch. When it arrived it was a single decker bus and we jumped on and I asked the driver if he could drop us off as near to the Puffing Billy as he could. He informed me his bus did not go past the Puffing Billy (on the main road between Bideford and Torrington) as he went through a few villages and ended up in Torrington itself by another route.
He told us the bus we needed to catch and as luck would have it that bus had just pulled up behind the no 70 and it was a double decker stagecoach one, we jumped on that one and the driver told me he would make a special stop right out side the Puffing Billy and then asked if we wanted a return ticket. No just the one way as we will be walking back to Bideford I informed him and when he asked for just £3.90 for both of us I was shocked at how cheap it is on buses in North Devon. That’s just £1.90 each for the road journey that is nearly seven miles and it costs the same on a stagecoach bus to get to Paignton bus station to our home just past the zoo a distance of only one mile.
So nearly two hours later than we had planned to start the walk we were at the start point and with the station on our left we first walked through the small tunnel to look at the line as it came into the station. We then turned around and headed out of the station and I have to say at this point while it is claimed its five and a half miles to Bideford station, it sure seemed a lot further than that and my legs were sure starting to ache a bit at the end of the walk.
Not far out of the station you come to the first of a number of bridges that go over the line, this one was a bit strange as its clearly very over grown on the top of it and there was no clue as to why it was built as there is no road or anything you can see that would have gone over it.
I was expecting the line to follow the river for much of its journey but discovered it sticks closer to the road far more and while you go over three viaducts in total over the river, it’s not really until to get nearer to Bideford that you see much more of the river. All the viaducts are small compared to the Ham Green viaduct we walked over on the Plym Line and as you approach them they don’t look that old due to the fact these viaducts did not have any walls built on them above the track level and modern safety metal fences have been added to stop people falling over the edge and into the river below.
The second viaduct we came to is at the site of a weir and I was able to get down the side of this one and underneath it and only then its clear to see and get a true sense of its age and construction. The third weir is the site of the fictional birthplace of Tarka the otter who was born in 1927 and here you learn by way of an information board that if you are very lucky and had lots patience you might see an otter, well we could have stayed there all day looking and I’m sure we would have never been lucky enough to see one.
So on we walked again and for some time the walk lacked any interesting discoveries other than the odd railway sign and one old small wooden railway shed until I could see the entrance in the distance of a long railway tunnel. I don’t know why these tunnels get me so excited but I just love walking through them and this one sure did not disappoint me in anyway.
It does have lighting inside of it and unlike the Shaugh Tunnel on the Plym Valley Line; this one has the lighting up on the roof and therefore is not so dark inside and can’t be so bat friendly as Shaugh Tunnel. Still it was one of the main highlights of the walk for me and I’m keen to learn where other tunnels are that I can get too and walk through.
After going under another road bridge we came to the old iron bridge that can be seen from the main road and this is a lovely spot as its more a nature reserve for wildlife with the river and mudflats and salt beds and don’t worry I was not tempted to try and walk on the mud as I foolish did on our river Teign walk.
We stopped here to eat a small snack we had with us and dear Carol sat down on the floor to take a rest and struggled to get up when it was time to get moving again and complete the last leg of the walk to Bideford station.
This last leg is on the other side of the river from Bideford and it sure was a welcome site for me when I first saw the town and the old bridge as I knew we would soon be pulling into the station. The line goes right behind the Jewson’s I call at and the train had an uphill climb into the station and the Bideford station is complete and unchanged from the day it was closed down and still has the signal box and the sidings with the buffer at the end of it and an old signal post that sadly no longer has the signal part on it.
There is an old carriage on the platform and the only thing I found strange was the bridge the line came over into the station from Barnstaple was very narrow and only wide enough for a single track as just before that bridge there is another platform that looks like it was made to be used by the Royal Hotel that sits on that platform( see Pictures) but this bridge looks original and I’m not sure if it was narrowed after the line was closed down but will try and find out if I can.
The line does carry on all the way to Fremington just outside of Barnstaple but we had walked far enough for one day and maybe we go back some other time and walk that section as well. We walked back over the old bridge into Bideford and as I was hungry I went and found a fish and chip shop, Carol did not feel it was a good idea for her to eat anything and so just helped herself to a few of my chips.
We came back a different way and I spotted a football pitch and so parked up and did a shoot at that ground and will do a post later in our grounds review board.
I really enjoyed our day walking the line and as Carol is getting some medical help as I write this, hopefully we can have a few more days out this week before its back to work again to earn a crust of bread.
