With this Wednesday being 'Guy Fawkes Night' I thought I'd post a photo of something I spotted at Llanuwchllyn station on the Bala Lake Railway a couple of months ago.
This 2ft gauge gunpowder wagon was originally used for transporting explosives around the Oakeley Quarry in Blaenau Ffestiniog when blasting for slate and had arrived from the Llanberis Lake Railway for restoration a few months earlier.
Whilst the metalwork needs some attention, the interior protective wooden panelling (presumably used to prevent the quarrymen's hob-nailed boots from striking sparks) is to be completely replaced by the BLR's Carriage and Wagon Department.
Despite constant disputes over the rates for slate shipment the Oakley Quarry sent slate over the Ffestiniog Railway until the railway closed in August 1946 but also had a connection to the London & North Western Railway exchange yard in Blaenau Ffestiniog and large tonnages of slate were sent out via this connection until the closure of the quarry in 1970.
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