Please see the dedicated booking page here for a step by step guide for how to redeem your voucher.

We’d love to be able to give this guarantee, especially on Green days however steam locomotives can and do from time to time decide that chuffing up and down the countryside isn’t for them. They can sometimes even have a fault develop during the day and have to be withdrawn from service, this is the last thing we want to do but passenger safety is of paramount importance so whilst we’d love to guarantee a steam locomotive will pull your train when advertised it isn’t aways possible. A heritage diesel can take around 30 minutes to get started up and going whereas a steam locomotive if it is stone cold will take a good 4 hrs to come to life.

We also rely on a 100% volunteer workforce, becoming a Fireman isn’t a 5 minute task, it can take years of practice to learn the art of shovelling coal and boiler control, only then can a person be assessed to fire a steam locomotive. It then takes a little bit longer to promote these Fireman to Driver so there are times in the year where we do struggle to get a steam driver or fireman to run our trains. We’re working hard on it to ensure this isn’t the case though, don’t worry! We still have space to take on more people that’d love to learn how to fire and drive this magnificant machines so do get in touch today, it won’t take 5 minutes and does require commitment but the rewards are certainly worthwhile!

The price and the availability of coal is currently currently causing the heritage sector an issue, coal has increased from £180 per ton late last year to over £400 per ton. We burn on average 1.5t of coal per day at the Spa Valley Railway so our costs per day have risen from £270 per day to £600 per day on coal alone! There might be days in the coming months that we have to re-evaluate our steam locomotive operating days to ensure we can continue to provide them for dining experiences and peak timetable days.

Whenever its safe to do so we allow access to our shed and yard viewing areas so you can see as many of our locomotives as possible.

Yes of course! We have space in the Guard’s van for most things, and several of our carriages also have a designated space at one end, but on children’s special events and gala days we encourage you to leave buggies/prams in the designated areas at Eridge or Tunbridge Wells West unless absolutely necessary.  If travelling in a larger group with multiple bicycles please contact us in advance to confirm if space will be available.