WIRRAL'S SEASIDE

 OK, let's do a bit of an about turn, heading towards the Irish Sea and the town of Hoylake. Here's the beach, photographed by Tom Bastin (Creative Commons License)

Hoylake's old lighthouse (Creative Commons License).

Hoylake is home to the Royal Liverpool Golf Club (Creative Commons License).

The Green Lodge in Hoylake sold Burtonwood beers when I last visited.

Bus operators in Hoylake included A1A Travel and Avon Buses.

Unit 507 026 calls at Hoylake station.

This signal box once controlled things at Hoylake.

Heading towards Wallasey, we reach Bidston station, photographed by Ben Brooksbank (Creative Commons License) in 1961.

A Merseyrail EMU calls at Bidston in 1982.

By 1989, the 508s had entered service.

Also in 1989, a DMU arrives at Bidston, having come from Wrexham.

Next stop, Wallasey Village. The Cheshire Cheese pub here was once a Higson's tied house.

A1A Travel also served Wallasey Village.

Into Wallasey itself, here's the town seen from the tower of St Hilda's church (Creative Commons License).

A postcard from my collection - the Town Hall in Wallasey.

Wallasey Corporation once ran trams. Here's car no. 22 on Liscard Road.

The Nelson in Wallasey is a large free house.

Sadly, the Prince Alfred has since closed.

Next, we come to the Wirral's premier resort, New Brighton. Here, the St Tudno is bound for Liverpool passing New Brighton Lighthouse in the Rock Channel.

A postcard of the Old Fort at New Brighton.

Here are the Vale Gardens, with Wallasey's famous tower (demolished in 1919) beyond.

New Brighton pier and ferry, with Liverpool across the Mersey.

New Brighton was the terminus of the Wirral Railway.

We now move forward to the mid 1970s.

There was once another, smaller, railway in New Brighton!

Wallasey's trams reached New Brighton, terminating at Victoria Road.

It seems that the Albion Hotel in New Brighton is still worthy of a visit.

The Commercial is also still in business, now called the Harbour.

Finally, we have Stanley's Cask, a renowned free house.

That's a great place to finish this post. Next time, we'll reach Birkenhead. Here's a map of the route so fatr.

TO THE WIRRAL

So, we've left Chester behind and our first stop is the station at Blacon, as photographed by Ben Brooksbank in 1961.

We're taking a rather convoluted route towards the Wirral - take a look at the map to see the journey. Now we're a place called Mickle Trafford, which was the home of Lofty's Coaches.

To the north is Stanlow Point, with the Manchester Ship Canal running alongside the Mersey.

We now fly across the Mersey and reach John Lennon Airport at Speke. This AEC Swift was used as an internal transfer bus.

Other buses to be found around Speke in 1993, photographed by Richard Huggins.

Next - a contrast in size of steam locomotives at Speke Junction MPD.

Not far away, the former Cheshire Lines Committee station at Halewood, with a Great Central 4-4-0, no. 270 passing through.

Time for a pint! A good place for beer is the Storrsdale, a former Tetley house, at Allerton.

Garston is our next stop, where we find LMS 0-6-0 tank loco no. 27496 in 1936.

Garston station was once operated by the CLC.

In 1979, Garston was the terminus of the Liverpool electrified network. The route has since been extended to Hunts Cross.

The short lived North Western bus company could be found in Garston in 1990.

A former North Western (the earlier version) Alexander Y type, AJA147B. seen in Garston in 1981 operating for Halewood Coaches.

We cross the Mersey estuary again to Bromborough station in 1961 (Ben Brooksbank - Creative Commons).

Sadly, the Archers pub in Bromborough is no longer seeing pints pulled.

Back to 1961 and we're at Bebington and New Ferry station (Ben Brooksbank - Creative Commons).

Coming forward to 1992 and Crosville/PMT fleet no. MDC915 is seen in Bebington.

These days, Ember Inns run the Three Stags at Bebington.

Heswall station, on the former Birkenhead Joint, is some distance from the town of the same name.

In Heswall town centre itself, it's the 1930s and we see the bus station and Telegraph Road.

Crosville once had a depot in Heswall.

In 2000 Arriva were operating into Heswall.

Avon Buses also served the town.

Happy Al's could also be found here.

We'll let Happy Al's transport us to nearby West Kirby.

On the approach to West Kirby station, 47293 is on engineering duty in March 1982.

A class 508 EMU stands at West Kirby terminus.

Here are a couple of postcards of West Kirby from my collection.

Just of West Kirby is Hilbre Island - more info here.

For our last stop on this post, we head inland to the Irby Mill pub at Greasby. I've heard good reports recently.

Next time, we'll explore more of the Wirral.