The Workshops Rail Museum Trip Bus Trip

On a lovely cool winters day 27 of us headed off on the yellow bus for our trip to The Workshops Rail Museum in Ipswich. We travelled via the tunnels to west Brisbane and headed out through Kenmore and Mount Crosby and stopped at Colleges Crossing on the Brisbane River for a lovely morning tea. There was a bit of a sneaky breeze blowing off the river, but it was nice in the sun. After morning tea, we drove the short distance to the museum in North Ipswich. One of the staff Sean who had been working there for 17 years and was a local boy gave us a very interesting short talk on the history of the workshop and how the museum started. We then headed off on our own in different directions to explore all that the museum had to offer. From steam engines through to diesel locomotives up to the tilt train and everything in between. You could spend a long time at the model railway display that showed all aspects of Queensland from sugar cane trains to mining, wheat and city life. There is a lot of activities for school children as well. We then headed up to the café which is housed in the original dinning room when the workshop was in full swing. The building is heritage listed so cannot be changed. In one of the room’s, we enjoyed a very nice 2 course lunch of roast chicken and vegetables and a big helping of homemade apple crumble and tea and coffee.

After lunch we had time for a group photo in front of the workshop before boarding the coach and drawing the raffle. Our driver Brian then took us on a tour of Ipswich CBD and Queens Park before heading home. We had a fairly good run home, little bit of traffic on the Western Freeway then back into the tunnels exiting onto Sandgate Road. Whilst there was some traffic on Sandgate Rd, at least it was moving not like the Gateway and arrived back in Redcliffe just on 4PM. Once again a great day had by all that went on the trip.