Rob Coles writes: “All eleven of the Bath Christmas Market trains ran as planned, a record, with more Christmas specials visiting Bath than all the other destinations combined.
There were four steam trains and seven luxury Pullman trains – including the prestigious Belmond British Pullman that made an unprecedented two visits and the Midland Blue Pullman visited three visits. The Northern Belle and The Statesman each made one visit. In total they brought an estimated 4000 visitors and travelled over 4000 miles.
The trains came from far and wide, including Newcastle upon Tyne, Preston/Carnforth, Crewe, Leeds, Chester, Solihull, Holyhead and London (4).”
Rob then offered his own observations of how these ‘specials’ could be better welcomed in future.
“Unlike road coaches that can drop passengers in sight of the market, train passengers leave the station with no idea which way to go. Were there direction signs? I didn’t see any on Sunday. I hear tell that one town had a band to welcome train visitors and guides to follow.
An official welcoming announcement on arrive and thank you on departing would be nice. Signage and perhaps a market trail would help. A Bath Market headboard on each train would be good city publicity. Little touches like this may encourage people to keep coming back. We cannot assume that they will. ”
Thanks for all your pictures Rob, and compliments of the season to you and yours.
