The Leamington–Rugby line was a 15-mile branch line built by the London & North Western Railway (LNWR) and opened in 1851. The branch connected Leamington with the mainline from London to Birmingham (now the West Coast Main Line which had been opened in 1838 by the LNWR’s predecessor, the London & Birmingham Railway (L&BR). Leamington ended up with two stations - Leamington Avenue (sounds posh, but then this is Leamington Spa after all!) for the Rugby branch, and the GWR’s adjacent station (this is still there, serving The Chiltern Line).
One of the engineering features of the branch was the five-arch brick-built Offchurch Viaduct which carried the route over the Grand Union Canal and adjacent low ground: the arch above the canal itself was built with skewed courses.
It’s actually quite impressive. A fair bit of the branch (there was a branch branch slightly east as well) stayed open long after Passenger traffic ceased in 1959, serving the Long Itchington cement works until the mid 80’s. All goes by road now, but at least a lot of the track beds are open as cycleways.
Anyway, this is my first entry. No photographic masterpieces these, that’s just not possible with a springer spaniel in tow (11 miles and he’s STILL charging around the garden at 100mph!)
Stockton Locks, Grand Union Canal. Eight locks here, with a rise of around 48 feet. At the bottom is the Blue Lias pub, named after the local clay which dates from the Jurassic Period (the pub sign is a dinosaur!). Actually, this section of the Canal is good for pubs, from the Two Boats by Long Itchington to The Boat at Birdingbury
a steam train.unfortunately the best i could get as the forest of dean railway are not currently operating their steam engines due to the elevated risk of fire from the dry weather. i didnt realise until i looked at the first pic that it actually looks like a model railway. lolthese were take this morning from the railway carparkforest of dean railwat no operate from the lydney town up past whitecroft station and are continuing to ope up ne sections of track.
While looking through what I have left to capture I realised that I already have a sandy beach shot of Fistral Beach from my trip to Newquay, Cornwall on July 3rd.
Stockton, Warwickshire, is surrounded by quarries for the local blue lias clay, used for cement manufacture. Most of the quarries are closed now, the railway line that served them is now a nature reserve, and the spur off the Grand Union Canal is there no more - the main quarry company was Nelson and Co, which had its own fleet of narrowboats.
While there’s still a cement factory at nearby Long Itchington, around Stockton all is peaceful.
But, handily, there’s an old water tower in amongst the old workings!
Just outside Banbury is the chocolate-box village of Wroxton, with a thatched pub, duck pond, and it’s very own Abbey, a 17th century Jacobean mansion, built on the site of a 13th century monastery. It’s lovely, and would make a great aerial photo, but it’s now the English campus of the American Fairleigh Dickinson College, so it seemed prudent to not do so.
Anyway, in the grounds are three “Treasures”. First off is my monument - a 50’ high obelisk commissioned in 1739 to commemorate the visit to Wroxton and the Banbury races by the Prince of Wales, Frederick of Hanover. Interestingly (and it’s amazing what you learn about your local area), whilst researching “monument” around Banburyshire, I discovered there’s a huge one just off Jct 11 of the M40 - Filling Station No 9 was a WW1 shell factory. It’s not just mounds in the earth, and hardly interesting, so I ignored it!
A fair bit beyond the obelisk is my No. 12 Something over 100 years old. The Drayton Arch - for a folly, it’s a fair trek beyond the abbey, but I guess those Jacobean’s liked a walk about the place. Scarily (and deliberately in shot), Banbury is rapidly encroaching - but then Banbury and especially Bicester are rapidly encroaching most of North Oxfordshire at the moment.
so the third Treasure relating to the Abbey is this - sometimes known as Wroxton Castle. It’s actually a Dovecote, built by Sanderson Miller in 1745 - he had a bit of a thing about castle-type follies (the sham castles at Hagley Hall and Wimpole Hall are his). But, if you were a dove, wouldn’t you want to be king of this castle?
Nobody’s submitted a “sandcastle” yet. That was to be my emergency get-out. But then I realised it was easier to find a “fort” called a “castle” than it was the prerequisite bucket/spade/sandy beach.
THERE ARE JUST TWO WEEKS AND TWO DAYS LEFT!! 
