1962 was quite a busy year for riding on BR branch lines, and it was the last long summer break between finishing school and starting full time employment in the autumn. Some of the lines visited were closed later that year or shortly afterwards.
During one week in August I did 5 days of travel with my school mate, using one of the all Wales rover tickets then available, and done on a daily basis from home on the North Wales Coast. Unfortunately I didn't take any notes at the time and the photo taking was rather spasmodic, so its difficult to work out exactly what we did.
The first day we travelled through Bangor - Afonwen - down the Cambrian Coast line to Dovey Junction - Moat Lane Junction, then down the Mid Wales Line, presumably all the way to Brecon, although for some reason I didn't take any photos there. The few photos I did take on the Mid Wales Line were only blurry views from the train. Return to North Wales would probably have been via Oswestry and Chester. (The Mid Wales line will be covered later on trips made in October 1962 and the last day of service on 29th December 1962)
The second day we did Bala to Wrexham, the photos taken on that trip follow. I haven't a clue how we got to Bala, presumably via Afonwen and Dolgelley, but the return would have been via Chester.
The third/fourth day we travelled to Shrewsbury, then by the Central Wales Line to Swansea, up the valley lines to I've no idea where, except that we must have passed through Abercynon where I took a solitary photo - of a 0-6-2T, to Cardiff, then returned home overnight via Newport and Hereford, arriving back in North Wales on the morning of day 4.
The next day (day 5) it was down to Hereford and part way down the Gloucester Line, but this was a solo trip as my mate must have had enough travelling by day 4.
Bala Junction - 7821 on the Barmouth to Ruabon train taking water with the connecting train to Bala on the extreme right
7418 on arrival at Bala Station