On the right side of the tracks

The Royal Scotsman is renowned across the world for class and style. And as Kate Patrick found out, it's well justified

For the Royal Scotsman's three-day swing around the West Highlands, I took along my 75-year-old father-in-law.

As a small boy coming from the north of Ireland to his school in Wales, he regularly made the trip by steam train from Stranraer, via much of Britain, and can still recite serial numbers on carriages.

Even though the Royal Scotsman is, largely, a modern train – only one carriage is older than 30 years – and diesel rather than steampowered, he was enthusiastic to share with me and the other passengers a significant appreciation of the finer points of single-track management, of the intricacies of shunting and a general observation-platform etiquette that was second to none. What better companion could I have chosen?

We rolled away from Edinburgh Waverley, having been piped aboard, and headed west into bright sunlight. I had packed and repacked six times, eventually settling on a patriotic tartan jacket for the first day – not a great choice as it turned out, as I resembled one of the immaculately upholstered sofas in the observation car.

Besides us, there were four American couples, three English, a pair of young men from Russia, a pair of young ladies from Germany and a handful of intrepid singles.

“I just want to know,” said Debra from San Francisco, as she sat in the open-air back section of the train facing the disappearing tracks, “when Hercule Poirot is going to appear.”

Hercule was not aboard; but another literary figure,‘Q', was – a cha...

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• By : Kate Patrick
• In : Best of Scotland
• Issue : 19
• Page : 52
• Words : 1,624