The Day
Early morning start… only to find parking spots already in high demand. S’funny how the 2 spare hours before the Expo starts at 9am just disappear into thin air! People come streaming in… a continuous flow of comments, amongst which are a few along the lines of “I wish I had room for that”. My response being “You have a backyard or garden?”.
Later in the morning comes an un-looked for kindness. A gentleman comes over and admires the setup then proffers me a free book from his railway book stall. “Garden Railways” by R.E. Tustin, published in London in 1949. Looking through it this week has been fascinating to see the effort he made to run an “O” scale railway in an English garden! And it operated during WW2 as well! Very inspirational and humbling to think I have it so much easier in garden railroading with LGB equipment.
On to lunch – a quick sandwich & coffee. Now the children are more evident, so the kiddie-wink train is rolled out with 2 gondolas loaded with stuffed toys. After the usual backwards/forwards/backwards fun – where I make out the little Stainz loco has a mind of its own – the loaded toys are given away, and the train retired until the next audience arrives.
Late afternoon highlights a small problem in the display. I didn’t realise that the low pile carpet on the stage is somewhat slippery and the circulating trains are causing the track to slide sideways and outwards on the curves. I’m depending on just the standard LGB fishplates to provide mechanical and electrical connectivity (rail clamps would have taken a week to install and tear-down!). And yes, on the main line there was a sudden cessation of movement – the track had sprung apart. A quick callout to the track repair gang (me) and live action returns. Later, the small 4-wheelers suffer a series of derailments as the moving track decreases the passing clearance for the two small passenger & freight runs. Oh dear! More leaping onto the stage to resurrect and reinstate the running of the train & carriages. This time the audience is suitably amused when I wave a few elephants from the circus diorama at them, and explain the accident as “elephants on the track!”.
Finally, we have the all-clear to begin packing up as the attendee numbers dwindle. The last soft toys go to worthy recipients, but the indomitable Stainz was still choofing around the circuit to the very end. Instead of just me to face the dire job of dis-assembly and packing, an army of older gentlemen sweep into action and the carriages, track and accessories are spirited to their boxes and carry cases in an hour and half – as against the entire day I took to set them up!
