Locomotion, locomotion, locomotion!
For sale, trainspotter’s dream home
IT is a character-packed home guaranteed to get the pulses of railway enthusiasts racing.
The disused station master’s house at Loth, Sutherland, has been put on the market – and is sure to cause a stir among fans of the golden age of steam.
Although the station has been closed to the public since the 1960s, up to eight trains a day still whizz past within feet of the building, which sits next to the Wick-Inverness line.
Rowland Chamberlain, who has owned the historic property for 22 years, has set an offers-over price of £150,000.
The sale includes the two-bedroom house, associated railway offices, waiting room and platform.
These buildings retain many original features dating from 1872, when the station was built for the Duke of Sutherland’s Railway.
In 1994, Mr Chamberlain, 68, fell in love with what was then a rundown cottage while out for a country walk. He spied a handwritten ‘for sale’ sign on the gate and bought it for £30,000 ten days later.
The antiques dealer had to fully renovate the property, which only got mains electricity six years after he moved in.
Mr Chamberlain said: ‘You see these places and fall in love with them. I never wanted to leave. It’s got a lot of atmosphere. It’s been wonderful.
‘In the early days it was quite draughty and cold but it’s never been miserable. It’s very peaceful. We get deer here from time to time. There’s the beach on the other side.’
He added: ‘ You get a feeling for the trains coming – the sound changes. They come by eight times a day.
‘People jump because they are going quite fast. They go at 50-60mph and they do go quite close to the window.’
Mr Chamberlain and his wife Claire are selling up because they want to move nearer to her family in Belfast.
But leaving will be quite sad for Mr Chamberlain, who has long been a railway enthusiast.
‘I was a trainspotter down South, in Burton upon Trent, at the end of the age of steam,’ he said. ‘I used to go and stand there in my anorak with my notebook.’
Original features include a cooking range and a double door leading onto the platform. The ticket office window and the original seat are also still in the waiting room.
Modern conveniences include satellite TV, broadband and multi-fuel heating. The house is five miles from the town of Brora, and six miles from Helmsdale.
It is only half a mile from the A9 trunk road to Inverness.
Instead of using an estate agent, the couple are selling the property via a website they have set up and listings in a railway magazine.
Mrs Chamberlain, 63, said: ‘Essentially it’s a collector’s item – and what we need is a collector.’