Rurex (widwed170118)

Rurex:  the rural counterpart of urban exploration (urbex) which consists of exploring abandoned rural structures.  (or so it says on an internet dictionary page)


The cutting for a disused rail line passes behind our garden fence and on through the village where much of it can still be seen, overgrown and fenced off.  There are several places where it is possible to get down to the side of the line and hop over the fence for a look at what remains. 

 Given that I did climb over the fence I'm going to claim this counts as Rurex :-) 

We're hoping to buy the section behind our garden,  our neighbours already own theirs,  so I have been doing some research on what covenants might apply.  One of them relates to access for maintaining the bridges, so I'll assume that is why the track we waked down to make this blip exists. 

The line was part of the Stratford-upon-Avon and Midland Junction Railway (SMJR)  which was developed as part of a route to carry iron ore from Northamptonshire to the West Midlands & South Wales.  As with many early railways, the business plan was precarious and things didn't go well.  It trundled on in various guises up to the early 60s.  More here on Wikipedia.   

One of the uses of the line was for the MoD's weapons storage depot at Kineton which is out of the village towards Edge Hill. During the early stages of the Cold war RAF Gaydon,  a couple of miles in the other direction, was a V-Bomber (Valliants) base, with some of the weapons stored at Kineton, so there might just have been some very interesting traffic along the line :-)

My effort for Wide Wednesday on the (optional) theme of travel - although there has been no travelling on this line for several decades :-)   

I'll go through the other entries tomorrow (Thursday) evening and award favourites and honourable mentions.  

**Edit**  I am again getting some odd results when I try to view the entries.  Blip Support are active and chasing the problem, but as insurance, if I have not given your entry a star and a short thanks for entering comment - please let me know.