33015 heads south through the Herefordshire countryside at St Devereux on 10 November 1984 with the 10:03 Crewe to Cardiff Central service. These trains remained loco hauled for a further two years, before DMUs took over - a very poor substitute for six Mk1 coaches! Although they were Southern Region locos, as this picture shows the 33s did stray considerably from their home area on day to day workings in the 1980s.

33017 heads down the scenic Wylye Valley with the 12:05 Bristol Temple Meads to Portsmouth Harbour service on 8 March 1986. It was only a few miles from here that this loco met its end less than two years later, when it hit a fallen tree while working a Portsmouth to Bristol service. At that late stage in their careers, even minor damage was enough reason for withdrawal. 33017 was placed in store for a while, before being moved to Vic Berry's of Leicester, where it was broken up in 1990.

Wearing its startling red livery (which thankfully it only carried for a short while), 33021 Eastleigh approaches Hinksey Yard (near Oxford) with the Pathfinder Tours 1Z41 05:30 Crewe to Dungeness 'Marshes Marauder' railtour on 7 April 2001. Although the tour had departed exactly on time, as often happens with railtours, it was 45 minutes late by the time it passed me, although thankfully just ahead of the Turbo unit coming down the relief line!

33032 passes Ebbw Junction, Newport with the 12:10 Portsmouth Harbour to Cardiff Central service on 21 October 1985. Alexandra Dock Junction Yard can be seen in the background, while the site of the former steam shed is on the left. Although an excellent location for viewing westbound trains, it is impossible to takes pictures of anything in the other direction, as this redundant road bridge is right up against the A4042 Newport by-pass.

33039 passes Bathampton with the 09:15 Portsmouth Harbour to Cardiff Central service on 1 September 1985. Not only has the loco been consigned to history, being withdrawn in May 1989 and cut up MC Metals at Glasgow two years later, but the bridge in the background has also been demolished. This was a farm occupation bridge, and as can be seen in this view it gave an excellent view of Bathampton Junction, where the Bradford-on-Avon line diverged from the Great Western Mainline.

33053 accelerates away from Ferry Meadows with the 1M48 13:06 Peterborough to Wansford service on 1 March 2008., during the Nene Valley Railway's Diesel Gala. The stock being used here is former Western Region Class 117 DMU 51401, 59508, & 51367. This is made up from vehicles from former sets L419 L421, & L429.

33056 The Burma Star & 33021 pass Sevington with the 6C56 11:23 Grain to Shakespeare Cliff on 2 June 1989, conveying Channel Tunnel concrete lining sections. At this time construction of the tunnel was well underway, but the meeting of the British and French tunnels was still a year away. Class 33s were employed extensively on works trains, not just these concrete section trains, but ballast and spoil as well. This pair certainly look impressive in their matching Railfreight Construction livery, and they also sounded impressive too on such a heavy load!

33063 races through Winchfield with the 14:10 Waterloo to Salisbury service on 28 August 1987. One year after the launch of Network SouthEast the rebranding had only extended as far as the repainting of two of the coaches in this train, plus of course the inevitable red lampposts on the platforms. Long after the removal of freight services from the station, a coal merchant was still trading from near the up platform in 1987.

Possibly the first ever visit of a Class 33 to Goole. 33103 waits to depart wrong line with 4-TC set 417 on 15 January 2000 with the Branch Line Society's 'River Don' railtour. The tour which had started from Birmingham New Street had earlier visited freight lines around Shirebrook and Sheffield before arriving at Goole via the little used Knottingley and Snaith line. The very brief stop here while the crew changed ends was just sufficient for this time exposure before the tour headed away into the night towards Doncaster, gaining the correct running line just after the level crossing to the south of the station.

Fragonset 33103 Swordfish leads 'Slim Jim' classmate 33202 Meteor through the Silver Birch lined cutting next to Kingsbury Brickworks with the Pathfinder Tours 1Z97 04:10 Yeovil Junction to Buxton 'Buxton Rotator' railtour on 1 May 2004.

33106 races past Newton Tony (between Salisbury and Andover) with the 09:29 Salisbury to Waterloo service on 19 April 1986, comprising 4TC trailer set 423. At this time the Salisbury trains were working in push pull mode using Class 33/1s, while the Exeter trains were principally in the hands of Class 50s. Although there are some good locations in the area, it is not recommended to venture too far, as the proximity to Porton Down makes the likelihood of the Military Police taking an interest in any photographers quite high!

Very nearly a unique picture. Apart from a local walking his dog, only one other photographer was standing in the rain at Stranraer Harbour on 18 May 2002 to witness the remarkable sight of a pair of Class 33s at this remote Scottish outpost. 33108 Vampire & 33021 Eastleigh slowly pull out of the Harbour station with the Pathfinder Tours 1Z33 18:32 (the previous day!) Crewe to Glasgow Central 'Rhins & Machars Crompton' railtour. 56106, on the other end of the train had brought the train in to Stranraer from Largs. As can be seen, the weather was absolutely terrible.

33110 approaches Water Eaton, on the Bicester to Oxford line with the Hertfordshire Railtours 1Z25 'Concrete Cow' railtour on 12 January 1985. Needless to say with a name like that, the tour had just visited Milton Keynes, and was heading back towards the Southern Region on what at the time was still a freight only line. The stock comprised 4-TC units 401 & 421, with 33106 on the rear working top'n'tail.

33110 & 33065 pass Gunstone Mills with the 6O74 11:20 Meldon to Tonbridge ballast train on 7 November 1990. Although the train appears to be running wrong line, what looks like a double track mainline is in fact two single lines. The right hand track is the Barnstaple branch, which the Meldon line joins at Crediton, a few miles to the east of this spot. Unfortunately I was experimenting with film in the Pentax 6x7 at this time, and this picture is taken on the truly awful Kodak Ektachrome 400, so apologies for the poor technical quality!

33116 (D6535) Hertfordshire Railtours passes through Tolworth station en-route to Chessington South with the D-Tours 'Tatty Cat' railtour on 4 March 1995. Utilising 4-VEP EMU 3581 as coaching stock, the tour started from Clapham Junction at 10:00, and traveled via Twickenham and Raynes Park to Waterloo. It then retraced its steps to Raynes Park, traveled down the Chessington Branch, before proceeding to Wimbledon, Guildford, Norwood Junction, Tattenham Court, Purley, Caterham, London Bridge, and finally Victoria. The 4.25 mile long Chessington branch was the last line to be constructed by the Southern Railway, opening just before the Second World War. All the stations on the branch have this distinctive 1930s Art Deco appearance with curved concrete platform awnings.

33117 passes the site of Bletchingdon station (or Bletchington as the GWR called it) with the 1E22 12:46 Fridays only Portsmouth Harbour to Leeds service on 17 June 1983. This train regularly brought a Class 33 to the Oxford to Banbury line during the 1980s. Although the loco survives, this viewpoint does not! While in 1983 the old station site was just an overgrown area with a few piles of abandoned timber, today it is a thriving industrial unit, and the whole area is dominated by towering piles of pallets! Even if it was possible to stand in this spot now, you wouldn't be able to see anything of the railway!

33202 approaches Bradford-on-Avon with the 1O36 10:07 Bristol Temple Meads to Portsmouth Harbour service on 21 February 1987. 33202 was one of a dozen Class 33s built with a narrower body profile for working on the Hastings line with its restricted clearances. Class 33 haulage was to last just over a year on this route, and although I have a fair number of pictures, in hindsight a few more visits to the area wouldn't have gone amiss!

'Slim Jim' 33202 accelerates away from Swanley station with a short rake of ARC PGA stone hoppers on 30 May 1998. This bridge affords an excellent vantage point in both directions, although you do have to know which way something interesting is going to come from as the road is the very busy A20 Swanley bypass and is not easy to cross in a hurry!

Running 90 minutes late (which at least meant the rain had stopped!) 33202 Meteor & 33103 Swordfish pass Up Hatherley (near Cheltenham) with the Pathfinder Tours 1Z48 06:27 Salisbury to Crewe 'Crewe Crusader' railtour on 10 September 2005.

33207 & 33029 pass Warton with the 6C51 11:51 Sellafield to Heysham Power Station nuclear flask on 9 June 2005. Here we have two thirds of the DRS Class 33 fleet, which was disbanded shortly after this picture was taken. 3100 hp is is possibly a little over the top for a single wagon! This was a lucky shot, as I just stopped off at the line on spec on my way to Scotland.

33207 Jim Martin crosses over the River Lochy at the appropriately named Lochyside with the Royal Scotsman 1H86 08:23 Spean Bridge to Fort William 'Western Tour' on 6 October 2007, which has just reversed at Fort William, and is now en-route to Mallaig, before returning to Fort William later in the day. Just a few years ago the sight of a Class 33 in Scotland would have been considered exceptional, but now this is a dedicated Royal Scotsman loco. As is often the case, Ben Nevis in the background is enveloped in cloud.