donderdag 29 juli 2010

A Yorkshire Classic: Celebrate the Railway Children in the gorgeous setting of the original tear-jerker


Daddy, my daddy!' shouted Bobbie, as the steam cleared and her long-lost father walked along the platform towards her. It was a cinematic moment like none other, requiring a year's supply of man-size tissues.
Now, 40 years on from the release of the original film, the village of Haworth, in West Yorkshire, is celebrating its enduring legacy as home to the Railway Children.
The film adaptation of Edith Nesbit's heartwarming book was made here during the hot summer of 1970.
You can visit all of the well-loved sights, from Bents House, the iconic family home known in the film as the Three Chimneys, to Oakworth Station, where the tearjerking scenes of the father's homecoming were filmed.
The tourist board is going full steam ahead next month, with Railway Children tours and the chance for children to ' be Mr Perks' on selected dates until September. Children - or grownups, for that matter - can take on Mr Perks's stationmaster role on the steam railway, operating the signals and greeting trains.
But you probably won't have to rip off your red petticoat to wave a warning at a train approaching a landslip.
Even if you are not a fan, a wander around the pretty village set in the Pennines deep in Bronte country and backed by wild moorland will be entertainment enough. The views make you gasp, as do the cakes in tea shops up and down the cobbled streets.
Stay in The Old Registry, with its nine individually themed rooms, and sample famous breakfasts, with sausages from local butcher Lishman's - one of Rick Stein's 'food heroes'. For Railway Children fans, Haworth won't disappoint.

Start at the visitor information centre in West Lane, which acted as the butcher's shop in the film.
From here follow the Railway Children Walk, a five-mile round trip. You can call in at the Royal Oak where William Mervyn - alias 'the Old Gentleman' - reportedly retreated one afternoon, still in costume, to enjoy a few ales with fellow cast members.
Nearby is the Bronte Parsonage Museum, named after Charlotte and Emily who lived here in the mid-1800s, and which doubled as Dr Forrest's surgery. The cosy Fleece Inn on Main Street with its stone-flagged bar is an idyllic stop-off. Stills from the making of the film line the walls.
The rooms above served as the location office and landlord Nick Hindle insists that Jenny Agutter (Bobbie) still visits every year to lead a charity walk. He proclaimed her as 'lovely, down-to-earth and fond of a pint of Landlord'.


Ten minutes walk from the centre of the village is the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway, which runs for five miles between Keighley through Damems, Oakworth and Haworth to Oxenhope - most services are still steam-operated.
It was here the famous landslide was filmed. A glass-fibre tree was slid up and down the embankment while the children battled to save the train from disaster.
Whether you want a pilgrimage to the Railway Children's spiritual home or simply to explore a charming English village, Haworth is just the ticket.

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