SEEING pictures of the Flying Scotsman racing through Dorset has brought back fond memories for 92-year-old Joan Power.

Mrs Power, who now lives in Shaftesbury Road, Poole, grew up in Grantham where she would hear the Locomotive 60103 "blowing" as it rushed past her secondary school at 12.30pm each day.

But despite the train being a huge part of the town's history, the pensioner says she has never seen it - and would now love to be able to visit the Flying Scotsman while it is on view at Swanage Railway.

She said: "The Flying Scotsman used to go through every day at 12.30pm. As it came through the Stoke tunnel, which is about five miles up the line, it would blow as it came into Grantham Station. It was "there's the Scotsman".

"All those years, I never saw it. I would love to go and see it now. I've watched things on it and everything, heard all about it. You can't not have an interest in the Flying Scotsman."

Mrs Power remembers being aged around 14, and a pupil at The National School when the train would pass through. Another student at the school at the time was Margaret Roberts, who later became Margaret Thatcher: "She was brainier than me," she said.

After leaving school aged 14, she then went to work in a nearby milk bar and chocolate shop, where she could still hear the Flying Scotsman as it travelled through the town. Mrs Power moved to Poole in 1947 after meeting her husband, Alec.

The Flying Scotsman will be pulling carriages and on view for ticket holders until next Tuesday. There are also tickets available to view it from Swanage Station, Gilbert Road Embankment, Court Road Viewing Area and the stations at Harman’s Cross, Corfe Castle Station Platforms and Goods Yard Area and Norden Station Platforms, and the opportunity to view the train in the Goods Yard at Corfe Castle in ‘light steam’ - with its engine lit - until April 10.