June 24th 2003, today we’re on the Cambrian Railways volunteering as a crossing keeper, currently trainee.

One of the first couple of jobs that we had to do when we arrived was booking on, followed by a number of other tasks which involved opening the gates, signing out the token, ensuring that the points were set and locked and chocked where required, ensuring that the marketing boards were hung to let people know that we were actually open today and then wait for the first train to arrive which would have been the 10.40am service from Western Moor with our first passenger service leaving Oswestry at 11am.

So here we are now standing by the points for the main line waiting for the 73 to come into the station.

The points have now been set back for the 73 to ingress into the platform, we’re just waiting for it to arrive.

The crossing keeper has given a green flag.

This is yet to be acknowledged by the 73 and now we’re on our way.

Another green flag.

Once the train has passed the points and they are reset back for passenger service, we then put the clip back on and put the chalk in between the blade and the rail.

Once the clip is back on the rail it gets locked so that it can’t be tampered with and the only way to take the clip off is to use the token which I am currently in possession of.

Overall there are a number of jobs that need to be done throughout the day to maintain a safe crossing, this is just a small snippet into that day.

We will now finish off this audio diary with some sound bites from both the 73 and Alan Athens.