AS usually is the happy event in the post-Easter holiday, we headed westwards up and over the A66 to catch the morning train from Kirkby Stephen along the incomparable Settle and Carlisle Railway.

Kirkby Stephen's where LNER and LMS met pretty much head on, where trains from Darlington to Penrith staggered over Stainmore to get their pipes at Kirkby Stephen East and where - a mile away at Kirkby Stephen West - the Midland, the mysterious and misplaced Midland, stopped briefly to find its bearings.

Kirkby Stephen East now forms part of an industrial estate, or business park, or some such. Kirkby Stephen West rapturously remains, now truly Sid and Barbara Jordan's station in life.

It's magnificent. A bygone age reminder of what country stations might have been; a floral, fragrant, faintly fabulous place; a station to stop in the tracks.

Last month the Prince of Wales halted there, too, marvelled at all that the Jordans and the Settle and Carlisle Railway Trust had done, asked the bairns from Kirkby Stephen junior school which lessons they were missing in order to wave a flag for him.

"Literacy revision," said the bairns.

"I'm glad I have my uses," said Charles, doubtless echoing a royal train of thought before returning, steam hauled, to the Duchess of Sutherland.

Sid had been the village polliss for 16 years, retired nine years ago, spent five years at Appleby ticket office before spotting in Rail News an advert for the "caretaker's" job at Kirkby Stephen.

A house, Platform Cottage, went with it. They moved in five months ago, when the Trust had renovated the once semi-derelict station.

"Kirkby Stephen station was absolutely disgusting to be honest," says Barbara. "The waiting room was so terrible you wouldn't go in it, not even when it was pouring down."

Now the gardens are weed perfect, the pristine waiting room vibrant with fresh flowers and with reading matter from Hello to Railway World, the whole place as manifestly cared for as if another dozen royal visitors were expected off the 9.52.

Making life more comfortable for those who only sit and wait isn't even part of their job description, however. "Neither of us could have just sat back and done nothing when the waiting room was right next door to our house," says Barbara.

"We were very happy down in Kirkby Stephen but this has been brilliant. We're really keen gardeners; I suppose that helps, too."

They've also, unexpectedly, become railway buffs. "I've just taken down the number of a passing freight train," Barbara admits. "I ask you, how sad is that?"

The Trust is also developing a Midland Room, a sort of LMS museum, and hopes to let four offices at the station.

"I can't tell you what a pleasure it is, it takes me right back to my childhood," said Prince Charles. "Thank God for enthusiasts like you."

"He was really, really nice. We didn't expect him to ask to see the house but he seemed quite pleased with it," says Barbara.

"You know yourself if you've been waiting around on a grotty station you don't really want to go back to it.

"We were determined we were going to bring this station back to life and people have been very kind with their comments. I like to think we're gradually getting there."

STEAM Railway, waiting room reading, not only reports that the Weardale Railway has "gone bust" but that an investigation is continuing up there into the Mardy Monster boiler incident. The Monster dropped a fusible plug. Whatever next.

THE Rt Rev John Crowley, the Arsenal supporting Roman Catholic Bishop of Middlesbrough, tells a splendid story of Pope John Paul II's visit to Britain in 1982.

A group of nuns had meticulously planned the dinner menu for the Pontiff's stay in London. Bishop Crowley, then secretary to Cardinal Basil Hume, was sent to scour Smithfield Market for the best steaks.

It was then that someone realised that the big occasion fell on a Friday and that while the church no longer insisted that Friday was fish day, the Pope would probably still wish to avoid meat.

The Vatican confirmed that, while he wouldn't wish to offend his hosts, John Paul would indeed prefer fish - and Fr Crowley was given the job of breaking the news to the nuns.

"There was pandemonium, but we managed to get some very good salmon," he says. "I had to eat steak for weeks."

THE Catholic Voice, incidentally, reports that the rather grandly titled Apostolic Prefect for the Falkland Islands - and sundry other bits of the south Atlantic - is Msgr Michael McPartland, born on the Grove Hill estate in Middlesbrough. Before turning to the church, Msgr McPartland was in a rather different mission field - a trainee salesman for Binns.

THE Church Times notes that as a memorial to retired headmaster Albert Williams - "notorious for his unending stock of jokes" - the folk of St Edward's church in Dringhouses, York, decided on a new set of numbers for the hymn boards.

When Mr Williams's son discovered all the jokes carefully preserved in a shoe box in the attic, it was decided to paste one on the back of each of the 70 numbers.

Now, says the Rev Martin Baldock, he can announce the hymn as "Instant cure for migraine; thrust your head through a window and the pane will disappear."

The Church Times does not record if this was regarded as one of Mr Williams's best.

RECENTLY included in the Sunday Times "Rich List", County Durham businessman John Elliott - left Toft Hill secondary at 15, wishes it could have been 13 - is going back to school.

Chairman of the St Helen's Auckland based Ebac group, world leaders in water coolers, the engaging Mr Elliott is learning German in order to strengthen the market over there.

The man who led the successful "No" vote campaign against a North-East assembly is taking lessons five days a week from 7am-8.30am; it's working.

"I can already count to three," he says - a drei run, as probably they never say in the wonderful world of water coolers.