Railtours
This page and contents last changed on Friday 5 September 2025 at 22:59
Tuesday 9 September 2025: 1066 Return
Our 4-car DEMU 1001 has been on loan to the Bluebell Railway throughout July and August. On 9 September it will return to St. Leonards Depot; you may travel on it both along the Bluebell line and thence to London Victoria and to Hastings, or any portion of its journey.
Travel is on a first-come, first-serve basis. We cannot carry standing passengers, so if all seats are taken you will be unable to board. Travel is as always subject to our Code of Conduct.
Tickets may only be bought on the train. A flat fare of £40 applies, except that for journeys wholly on the Bluebell route (between East Grinstead and Sheffield Park in either/both directions) a reduced fare of £20 applies. We accept cash and card payments on the train.
Finalised timings have now been published for all parts of this move:
East Grinstead (Bluebell): 1110 depart
Sheffield Park: 1155 arrive, 1250 depart
East Grinstead (Network Rail platform): 1336 arrive, 1340 depart
London Victoria: 1451 arrive, 1518 depart
Hastings: 1741 arrive
Saturday 20 September 2025: HDL 100 Not Out railtour
Our final railtour of the 2025 season will be our one-hundredth railtour since we returned our Hastings DEMU to the main line in 1996. This trip is to Oxford, Leamington Spa, Warwick, Stratford-upon-Avon, and Birmingham Moor Street. For all details and booking instructions, please see the railtour’s own webpage.
Plans for future railtours
Possible dates for your diary (updated 16 August 2025)
Our next railtour after September 2025 will be either around New Year or in spring 2026. We will keep this section updated as best we can with the available information.
Further information and resources
Code of Conduct
It is a condition of holding a ticket for any outing on our train that passengers abide by the letter and spirit of our Code of Conduct (updated May 2023).
Leaning out of windows
We continue to endeavour to keep our passengers safe by not allowing them to lean out of our train’s windows. This notice (updated January 2021) contains further information.
Booking Conditions
By travelling on an HDL railtour or buying a ticket to do so, you are deemed to be accepting our Booking Conditions as well as our Code of Conduct.
Accessibility Policy
HDL’s 1950s-built train may pose difficulties to certain classes of user: our Accessibility Policy describes what these are and how they may affect users.
Folding bicycles
It may be possible for you to bring your folding bicycle on the Hastings DEMU, with prior written approval; our guidelines on carriage of folding bikes will help you to determine your bike’s suitability for carriage.
Railtour Archive
We can recommend a dip into the HDL Railtour archive, which contains details of all the previous “days out” which HDL has operated to date; you may also find interesting our YouTube Channel which contains 32 cab-ride videos featuring outings during 2016–18.