Wayne arranged to get some Lamp Posts made and has install the first one for the Carpark. Has also added a Veranda Roof to Coffee Shack to keep rain off window which was leaking. Had some casting to build a Power Hacksaw to a design from the 1965 Model Engineer mag, Peter obtained a suitable gearbox and motor and has got operational and is using to cut parts for the Baldwin loco. Have had annual staff meeting, Track has been inspected this time pulling some bolts out of the No.3 Bridge, a draft update to Safety Case & System has been sent to Auditor. Anita is to be the General Manager and Scott is to be the Engineering Manager looking after Maintenance also details re completed Wheelchair Carriage.

Humphrey moved in last week to keep Eyore company. The patched up playground plane is looking a bit tidier with a repaint. Found the axles spinning on the new wheels as greased the end swivel bushes when installed into A82. Will have to add a lug to axle end caps in mean time mainly running A81. Wayne has started running a power cable from Coffee Shack to toilet. Went to the EMEX show, Model Engineers had Peter's Traction Engine on display which he has up for sale, requires some money to buy materials to build the Baldwin Loco.

Ikon Loco Works have supplied the 2nd set of Wheels which have been put into carriage A82. These are based on the model engineers design with the wheels spinning independently on the axle and should reduce rail squeal on the tight curves. Peter has started building 5" gauge model of narrow gauge Baldwin loco used in the first world war to run at the Winter Creek Railway. Someone let the guinea pigs get mixed up and we have a lot of baby guinea pigs at the moment.

Wheel chair carriage B48 has been fitted with eye brackets to secure wheel chair and latch to hold up seat. No 3 Bridge is nearly 20 years old now and on inspection of bolts found zinc coating at end of life with bolts starting to rust. Have started to pull bolts and grease with open gear lubricant. The playground plane had the tail broken off, so this is now No. 1 maintenance project just need to unbury woodworking tools in Roundhouse. Wayne's making progress with his house fitting a colour steel roof.

Ran the Tribute train on 5th Jan, Ted use to tell people our train was a similar size to ones used in the first World War. Came across a DVD War Trains Volume 1 at 'The Warehouse' last chapter has actual footage of these, bit larger though 600mm gauge. Wayne obtained a 2nd hand window for Coffee Shack about 100mm too long. Managed to pull it all apart cut it down and put back together and install. Me, Peter and Frank did a Sunday trip out to G.V.R. to have another go at making drop pit more serviceable. Loosened up 2 more rusted solid bottom pins, only 5 more to go.

Little Toot passed annual boiler inspection, Wayne has been held up on getting Coffee Shack finished due to not finding a suitable serving window within his budget, in meantime has thrown together a storage shed behind Round house which we plan to put the wooden patterns in and then borer bomb them. Found time to go out to G.V.R.'s Kids Train Day, very busy 3 trains running.

The new carriage B48 has arrived, rides well, could do with something to lock wheelchairs in place but overall quite satisfactory.

Very wet school holidays so far and still getting soapy water coming down the creek. Wayne's $1 coffee shack is going back together. Notice a Kaka visiting this week, about the size of a Wood pigeon, upsets the chickens when it flies over, neighbours had seen it a while back but this is the first time we had seen it around. Anita's first granddaughter, Julie's first great granddaughter Mercedes went for her first steam train ride last Sunday. The new carriage is still not here yet but shouldn't be far away.

The Railmotor is back on its wheels. Have fitted a C2 VDO cycle computer, displays time speed & trip distance and can be adjusted to a small diameter wheel. Still in process of making an axle mount for the magnet. Will make it easier to keep track of number of times we have gone round the circuit. The new playground is coming along, have a new fire station playhouse to go with the fire engine. Made a visit to Ikon locomotive Works still a fair bit to do, to finish carriage. Still need to make a new cap for Little Toots clack valve so might be a struggle to have ready for Saturday. Eeyore is looking a lot better, not limping but still needs to be kept on a strict diet.

Don't Feed the Donkey! Eeyore is very ill with Laminitis and needs to be kept on a strict diet. Have been clearing scrub from old sawmill storage area to make a new play area. The Railmotor has wheels out for flanges to be built up and wheel profiles to be trued up. Ikon locomotive Works report they have completed bogies and are starting on the body work for the new carriage.

Have placed an order on Ikon Locomotive Works for a new carriage with a compartment suitable for a wheelchair, plus an extra set of carriage wheels. The toilet block has had a ramp added for easier access. We have had our annual staff safety meeting and the external Safety Audit has been done. Popped up to Warkworth to see the Re-Launch of the Jane Gifford.

Peter's building a 7¼" Gauge Loco and took the underframe up to Winter Creek Railway, to give the engine components a test run on steam. Frank's back from his UK tour brought back a DVD, have captured a few stills below. Getting ready for the Annual safety audit, had track inspected, checking paper works etc. is up to date. The Bobcat has been put on the back burner, the temp shelter blew over, have got 6 new hoses ready to go back in and welded up one of the cracks in the lift arm.

The new toilet is operation, still need to get the power on. The Bobcat had a major oil leak, is proving a bit of a mission, having to pull just about everything apart to get to the leak. Frank is off to the UK to chase Steam Trains, should have some pictures of his adventures next time.

Wayne's making more progress on toilet with tile floor in, was interrupted with a shack on Trademe for a $1. Had to pull it down to bring it here, plans to make it into a coffee shack in park area. Next door neighbour Peter (a sparky) offered to give a hand. Has repaired concrete mixer motor, removing concrete and replacing lead. Now just need to finish patching concrete mixer bowl plus a cover for motor. Peter also had a go at shaper motor, stripping down, cleaning out bulk of grease and grime, is now ready to go back on to shaper. Novalok had a special on shelving was allowed to spend nearly $2k on shelving rated to take 8 tonne of stuff, to go in new Garage and Round House. Have cleared up all the stuff such as coffee machines which have appeared on garage floor and stored on new shelves. Anita obtained an ex Hirepool Chipper / Mulcher off Trademe. Will be able to make our own mulch for bird cages, instead of buying in. Have repainted Workshop water tank which will hopefully keep water a deg or 2 cooler. Having hassle getting boiler treatment in at end of day with 3/8" Penberthy Injector, which likes water supply to be cooler than 20 deg C. With water from tap at 19 deg C, have to drain side tanks, cool them down then refill, are then able to get injector working perfectly with out wasting provide have a hot bright fire.

Have standardised our Opening hours, 10am to 4pm for every opening day. First train 10.30am and last train 4pm with trains ½ hourly for Steam Loco and approx. ¼ hourly for Railmotor. Will keep running to 4.30pm on Sundays for next month or two. Plan to have Steam loco running 1st Saturday of month plus a few others. Have fitted an artificial rain device to Railmotor, Anita was getting over keen on rail greasing getting grease everywhere trying to stop squealing. Frank has been give a hand with evening track work greasing joints.

Had a photo stop in the budgie paddock for the first train of the year. Has now been 5 years since Ted past away, Little Toot is still running but not as often now. Ran the Tribute Train on 5th Jan as usual with Little Toot No. 1, Bogie Flat Top U7 and Carriage A82. The Passenger Train was put in the loop siding consisting of Railmotor RM1 and Carriage A81.

The railway is now running Daily till 26th Jan with the Steam Loco running on weekends. Made up a rough pdf poster below, which you can download. Had a number of Christmas and Birthday party bookings for December Frank booked a charter for his 70th Birthday. Wayne's finished the internal lining & wiring in Toilet Block and now started on floor tiles. Had another go at grinding in brake valve with extra fine grinding paste. No more leaking past valve but now having problems keeping lubricated, might need a bit of a leak to help spread the oil. Have done a little bit more widening of tunnel cuttings and building up of bridge embankments.

Little Toot had annual boiler survey last week, replaced the regulator ball valve and cleaned out coal bunker for internal repaint. Did survey early as have some big groups coming at time I had planed to do it. Wayne's been working on the internal lining of Toilet Block. Anita & Julie have been doing a gardening course. A cabbage tree grew up beside water pipeline breaking open A joint and we lost 3000 gallons of Little Toot's water supply. Hopefully get a big rain fall before Christmas but seem to be in the weather pattern where it misses Stanmore Bay, Orewa & Manly get rain but not us. Last Saturday went to the Last Spike Centenary celebration at Pokaka for the North Island Main Trunk.

A new leasee has taken over the Restaurant is now ABRUZZO Ristorante Italiano Ph (09) 424 0898 Had to run little Toot a few extra days as had a few problems with the Railmotor engine. The crankcase cover bolts came loose leaking oil on to rails and belts causing everything to slip. Then the choke stem broke and had to replace the carburettor.Pumkin has a new home is now down beside Upper Tee tree Viaduct. Wayne is making progress on new Toilet block has the doors on now shouldn't be long to complete now, hard part was making the doors.

Finally got a new budget PC to do the webpage etc, hopefully have transferred all the data to the new machine, if not to late now as have installed Ubuntu on old machine. The North Island Main Trunk railway line was completed a century ago this year, one of the events celebrating this was the re-enactment of the Parliamentary Special of 1908. Mr Fencer HBC Ltd has completed the new uneatable boundary fence to keep the donkey in. Has been a struggle to get things done with the excessive wet & windy weather. The tunnel slide is finally ready. The deck shelter frame was patched up and a new cover purchased but was put up a week to soon and was blown away, have patched it up again ready for tomorrow.

The new boundary fence is starting to go up, had a chap volenteer to help pull down the old fence in the middle of the first big storm, driving his vehicle into the fence shearing off a braced strainer post the gate was hanging on then spining round a telephone pole and backing into the fence. the big storms knock down quite a few more trees but not as bad as last year. Frank has been giving us a hand with replacing side panels on A82.

The survey pegs are in for the land swap, paperwork still being processed. The Main sign has been pulled out and one panel re-mounted on other side of driveway. Now waiting for fencing contractor to be available again to put up the fence. The tunnel slide is currently in the middle of a muddy mess. Anita is levelling the ground off and installing a low level wall to retain bark around the slide. The old steel jungle gyms have had new feet fitted and a new ladder made to link the two. FRONZ Conference was in Hamilton this year with side trips Goldfields Railway, Martha Gold Mine, Victoria Battery Tramway, Hamilton Signals Museum and Bush Tramway. RAIL SAFETY AWARENESS WEEK is coming up shortly July 21st - 27th. Our PC is nearly dead, crashes regularly so If you don't get a response from a E mail try our fax line (09) 424 5065 or Ans Ph (09) 424 5018. The latest version of AVG wants something else upgraded to be able to install.

The Station is back in action, with Wayne's fridge & freezer moved out to the new garage. Julie & Anita want to serve tea's and coffee from station, to groups on normal operating days so will need to move the track over and widen the platform. Have started to build up ground level beside track before station. Had to put fencing contractor on hold as all the underground power & phone lines plus water mains run along or across boundary. Council has decided to do a land swap to even up our boundary with the road. The surveyor should be coming next week. Anita has started setting up the playground tunnel slide.

Trying to get some more done on the Turntable, poured another section of ring wall. A few hassles getting started, got the concrete mixer back, found concrete in the motor and holes in the bowl. Decided to mix concrete by hand in a wheel barrow, then the wheel crapped out on the wheel barrow purchase a new barrow and eventually got another section of concrete done. Are getting a contractor in to put in a new road boundary fence. Something the donkey can not eat or get his head over and push against. The Council is not interested in going ahead with purchasing the 5m² the footpath is sitting on and seems quite happy with us putting up a new fence on the boundary. Took a weekend off to go to Silver Stream Railway's 25th Celebration, ran goods trains hauled by DE's Big C and little C on Saturday then passenger trains on the Sunday along with the Steam crane doing lifting demonstrations. The Thai Railway Restaurant will be open for lunches over the School Holidays and has some new lunch menu options open sandwiches, wedges etc.

Our Safety Case has been approved & now have a full licence to operate under the Railways Act 2005. The new garage is in place started moving a few bits in. Getting a few odd jobs done, bike stand put in behind Station, cleaning up stored rail & oiling, replacing the odd broken sleeper in sidings, Wayne has got the roof on the new toilet building. Took a day off to go to GVR's railfan day, great to see two WW class Loco's double heading. The self catering birthday parties are proving very popular had to get another BBQ to hire out.

Anita has obtained some more Playground Equip off Trademe, just need to install it now. A new single garage is about to be put in which will give us some more storage space. Should be able to get station waiting room back into use and make some room in workshop for working on Caboose. Next planned Steam running days 22 & 23 March, 19 & 20 April and 26 & 27 April.

To mark the passing of 'Ted' the creator of the Whangaparaoa Railway, a special train was run at 11.30am on 5th January. Consisting of Railmotor RM1, underframe of C43, flatcar U7 and side tip wagon YD6 loaded with a little blue truck and red VW car now with the axle fixed. The Steam passenger train was put into the station siding.

Re Drain Rain, did a night search of creek bed found quite a few eels & native fish but could not see any koura. The soap suds have died down a bit, but noted another burst of suds came through late mid morning Saturday.

Little Toot's boiler survey was good and is running quite well now with both injectors working good and the main water supply tank now fill, there is no mucking around with buckets. The days we have been operating the steam loco has been a bit erratic lately but will be running tomorrow 2nd Dec and for some big charter groups on 5th & 13th Dec.

The reason they put those adds on TV re storm water drains draining rain only is because it runs through places like the Whangaparaoa Railway. There is a lovely little creek running through the middle of the property with native fish, koura and eels. It would be appreciated if you could wash your car on the grass instead of over or near storm water drains. In our case particularly residents in Blue Heron Rise, Brian Cres, upper parts of Viponds Road etc as the run off goes through or near the railway down past the Leisure Centre then out to sea at end of Stanmore Bay Beach. If a dozen people decide it is a good day to wash their car and there has not been much rain get a high concentration of soap suds coming down the creek as on 27th Nov. Many years ago used to have frogs here but are far to polluted for that now being just a little green spot in the middle of suburbia.

Having problems with our PC lately, run out of grunt to run the security software and to old to upgrade. Had to dump the Trend Micro software, was looking at getting a new machine but managed to get operational with AVG free. Are mainly running the Railmotor with 1 carriage at the moment on the ¼ hour can still easily carry 100 + passengers a day. Little Toot was put back together in time for the overseas tour group, some repairs done water tanks painted, new delivery pipe and clack valve for LH injector fitted and the brake valve faces ground flat. Still needs more work done can run as is occasionally at the moment but boiler survey is coming up soon. The Caboose has had a little more done, finished welding new pieces on to underframe, cleaned up and primed. Anita has done a lot of work on the peddle cars, patching up the fibreglass bodies and repainting. The new deck is in and proving very popular with party groups. The trampoline has been moved into the budgie paddock and feet dug in to bring level, intend to dig a pit and have it flush with the ground at some stage. Have decided to put a flushing toilet in pumpkin’s pen which Wayne intends to build. Pumpkin has been moved to one of the rabbit runs. As part of our Business planning we obtained an update Council Aerial photo of our site. This included the boundary lines which shows a big chunk (1890m²) taken off our front road boundary. The line cutting through side of Little Toot’s water supply tank. This was what the Council wanted to take in mid 70’s when they raised the level of the road. Have already taken 2401m² for the road back in 1959 we objected and at the time thought we had negotiated to keep the land to the top of the road batter. According to Landonline Data our official boundary is still to the centre of the footpath. One of our possible future plans was to relocate the track closer to the road and go round the workshop as the No 1 bridge is slowly sinking in places and the curve to it, is a bit to tight. This would be impossible if council wants to take another big chunk of land and with developers wanting the property to build rest homes on , the land zoned residential perhaps we should just sell up. Just had a reply from the Council, only want to take 5m² for the footpath area so should be all good.

Early in July was hit by another weather bomb with excessive winds knocking down many trees, blowing away the temporary carriage workshop and damaging the shelterstation tents. Spent weeks cutting up fallen trees and branches. The gear in the carriage workshop has mostly been moved back into Workshop and Roundhouse, clogging up space for maintenance. The Railmotor RM1 is back from Ikon Locomotive Works, ran a test train of 2.3 tonne and stopped with hydraulic transmission on steepest downgrade and started from standstill on steepest upgrade. The ground has been levelled behind the Aviary for a party deck to be built. We had a business planning meeting in which it was considered for bulk of our paying passengers any train would do, so will be dropping steam from our Logo and mainly running the Railmotor from now on, still no consensus on where any new buildings could be built. Will still need to get steam loco operational again for a overseas tour group currently booked for later in the year.

Only 2 more Days to go then we close for 2 months. The Railcar has been booked to go to Ikon Locomotive Works to have hydraulic transmission fitted, wheels repaired and generally tidy up. This should make it more suitable to run a short passenger train and will not require a driver with a steam ticket to operate. The Shaper has been moved into workshop and is off the wagon. Having more problems with Little Toot's LH injector, had to replace delivery jet in just under a year of fitting a full new set of jets. Think the oxygen scavenger one of the boiler treatment chemicals is attacking the jet material. Still to upgrade piping to this injector, nearly have all the bits ready to do this now. Little Toot's motion is all getting a bit worn, hopefully don't fine anything to major, and get repairs all done within 2 months along with Caboose and some track repairs.

Anita's been digging a new drain in budgie paddock. The new path and garden she put in stopped the storm water going to drain on platform and directed it straight towards the railway track. Have not had much rain lately so not to sticky to dig, but could definitely do with some rain. Someone left a tap on before school holidays and lost over 4000 gal from main tank. Have been bucketing water to Loco from small tank by Roundhouse when operating. Had to replace a badly corroded union rail by the Workshop. Arranged to get truck to pick up Ted's Shaper that was on loan to GVR, is now clogging up our flat top wagon. Need to clear out some space in back of workshop and get it unloaded.

The temporary carriage workshop is up in place over the extension siding. Bevan Welch has taken on the project of completing the little Traction Engine which he has taken away to Parakai. Have obtained some brass Hex and machined up some more fittings for Little Toot's LH injector.

Someone sabotaged the electric fence and that evil donkey got into the sheep & goat paddock chasing them about and kicking Jerry, dislocating a kneecap. The vet managed to pop the kneecap back into place, it came out a couple more times but seems to have settled down now. In the process had Jerry contained in shelter by station which was rather dilapidated. So Anita decided to pull the shelter down then rebuilt it with 2nd hand materials. Anita has also purchased a 1/3 size wooden Truck and Fire Engine to add to the kids play things.

The idea of catching the Ferry to Gulf Harbour then coming to the Railway for a Train ride has finally happened. On 2nd March the Railway Enthusiasts' Society arranged for a group to catch the evening ferry from Auckland to Gulf Harbour. Then charter a Coach to the Railway for a Thai meal and a train ride, afterwards taking the Coach back to Auckland. So popular wanted to book a 2nd trip, but this was going to be after daylight saving. With everything falling apart faster than we are fixing it, sorting out the Loco lights is not a high priority at the moment.

G.V.R.'s Steam Festival is coming up 10th & 11th Feb, have a booking for Steam train on Saturday but none for Sunday and expect to be quiet so will run Railcar for the Sunday 11th Feb. Will also run Railcar on 3rd Feb at reduced entry charge, Single $5 and 5 Entry for $20. The VW peddle car had a new axle fitted and is back in action. Are working at making a flat area at extension siding so we can put up one of these garage tents as a temporary carriage workshop. Some large lumps of concrete have been dug out from behind Restaurant to build up a wing wall for the No 2 Bridge.

Colouring competition winners are Rebecca Barros for 7 - 8 yrs, Levie Epsom for the 5 - 6 yrs and Cole Sussock for under 5yrs. Each winning a train ride & entry to animal park for their family, a Little Toot Colouring book and either a Artist set or Thomas toy. As per usual on 5th Jan ran a tribute train for Ted at 11.30am. All looking a bit sad with the Caboose still in bits and a peddle car with a broken axle for a load.

Happy New Year; Passengers on our first train of year had a brief stop in Budgie paddock for a photo. Get those entries in for the colouring competition, Time is running out.