Gloucestershire Warwickshire Steam Railway will be recreating a number of well-known ‘Holiday Express’ trains on four Wednesdays this August.

The special trains will be hauled by the railway’s resident steam locomotives and will be specially named in order to create a nostalgic look back on summer holidays to the seaside by train whilst travelling through the delightful Cotswold countryside.

The trains and dates are as follows:

‘The Devonian’ will run at the GWSR on Wednesday the 2nd of August 

‘The Devonian’ was a passenger train for London, Midland and Scottish Railways (LMS) the Great Western Railway (GWR) and later British Rail (BR). The train ran cross country, starting at Bradford and making its way to Paignton and Kingswear in Devon, calling at Leeds, Sheffield, Derby, Birmingham, Cheltenham, Gloucester, Bristol Exeter and Torquay.

The service first began pulling holidaymakers back in 1927 and hauled by LMS Scot, Patriot, Jubilee, Black 5 and Capriotti class with GWR operating using Large Prairies and Castle class locomotives. The Second World War bought an end to these popular services, however, they returned in 1949 with trains operating until 1975 with service reinstated once again from 1987 to 2002.

‘The Cambrian Coast Express’ will run on Wednesday the 9th of August

‘The Cambrian Coast Express’ was a passenger train operated by the Great Western Railway (GWR) and later by British Rail (BR). The special service ran from London Paddington to Aberystwyth and Pwllheli, calling at Shrewsbury via the Cambrian line which runs through mid-Wales and the stunning Welsh coast.

The named train began service in 1927, running on Fridays and Saturdays and in the latter end of the 1950s saw operations increase to a daily except for Sundays. The train was steam hauled up to 1965 with its last service hauled by Gloucestershire Warwickshire Steam Railway’s very own No. 7820 Dinmore Manor!

‘The Atlantic Coast Express’ will run on Wednesday, the 16th of August

‘The Atlantic Coast Express’ was better known as ‘ACE’ by both enthusiasts and passengers back in the day and marked the principal express train for Southern Railway (SR) running from London Waterloo to the West Country.

The train began service in 1926, running through to 1964 serving up to nine different destinations in Devon and Cornwall, such as Plymouth, Bude, Ilfracombe and Padstow. In the 1950s, the services were pulled by the iconic Bulleid Pacifics, which saw increased speeds and journey times, which aided reliability and timekeeping for passengers, creating the first ever ‘mile a minute’ schedule.

‘The Cornishman’ will run on Wednesday the 30th of August. 

‘The Cornishman’ was a passenger train for the Great Western Railway (GWR) and ran from London Paddington to Penzance in Cornwall. The named train first ran way back into the summer of 1890 and saw service until 1936.

‘The Cornishman’ saw a return to British Rail’s Western Region as the region’s first named train in 1952 with the service operating from Wolverhampton and in the early 1970s saw start locations move further north, including Bradford and Leeds.

To find out more about the ‘Holiday Express’ trains or to take advantage of a 5% discount for tickets booked online, please click here.