The Stockton and Darlington Railway is generally regarded as the first public railway in the world. Other railways will claim to be the first at some aspect of railway functioning, but the S&DR was the first to bring together the main features of a railway – a public service carrying fare-paying passengers, using steam locomotives operating on tracks laid to what we now know as “standard” gauge. And it opened 200 years ago, on September 27, 1825.

The first train was pulled by Locomotion No. 1, now preserved at a museum bearing its name, “Locomotion”, at Shildon, County Durham.

As it happens, the Stockton and Darlington Railway is very close to where my brother moved when he left home, and where many members of his family still live. In fact, when I visit them I travel on trains running on part of the original trackbed from 200 years ago. And the entire area around Darlington has been a major focus for the national celebration of the bicentenary of railways in 2025.

I took my nephew to “Locomotion” – the first time I had visited the museum, despite its proximity to where I had been staying.

Parked prominently outside the museum was Flying Scotsman, possibly the most famous steam locomotive in the world.

Not far from the museum in Shildon is the town of Barnard Castle, another place I had never previously been.

The Butter Market at Barnard Castle, County Durham.

Another of my nephews has two small children, and for various reasons (that I don’t want to explain here) I hadn’t seen them on my previous visit. So I wanted to spend time with them, and I was persuaded to take them to an amusement park called Flamingo Land. I’m not a fan of amusement parks, but the kids clearly loved it (despite being too short for many of the rides), and among other attractions it included a zoo. I was able to point out several animals from Australia, including many that I had never seen in the wild.

Yellow-footed rock wallaby (petrogale xanthopus) at Flamingo Land Zoo.