Having loaded up Doug’s van on Friday morning Tim and I returned to Faversham and the Abbey School in the evening to unload and set up the layout. This then allowed us plenty of time to dress it and test it on Saturday morning before the exhibition started. The EKOGG stand was personned by Angela with Fred and Martin switching between the stand and the layout.
Angela and Fred were quickly into their stride on the EKOGG stand explaining the benefits of our little group and handing out leaflets to anyone bold enough to get within striking distance of them. Apart from the leaflets we also had a display stand with a selection of Tim’s narrow- gauge stock, Martin’s diesels, Fred’s GWR locos and my SECR D Class and a Birdcage coach.
Queen Charlotte Dock again performed well on both days with no major issues apart from operator fatigue and a bit of buffer lock on some stock. On Saturday our new trainee driver Fred took control of the high-level passenger services for a while and on Sunday Bill joined us for some freestyle shunting on the dockside. The layout continues to be popular with the public both young and old and we received many compliments and also an invitation to exhibit it at East Grinstead. In accordance with our usual practice youngsters were invited to have a go on the controls and going forward we will have some stickers to give them as a reward for their “help”. Regrettably far too many layouts at shows appear to have no interest in interacting with the public and operators hide behind their layouts avoiding eye contact. Chris
