Cloudy skies loom over the English countryside

Green fields and tiny houses with well trimmed gardens

The train is packed with commuters

Everybody is glued to a smartphone

Annoying Rap music escapes from headphones but nobody says a word

Brits love to suffer in silence with a stiff upper lip

Vandals leave their mark with colorful graffiti on bridges

A stark contrast to the dark stone aged by centuries of pollution

We are riding the TransPennine Express

Mighty steam trains first conquered this route

No billowing smoke and steam from today’s silent electric trains 

The smell of soot replaced by the bitter aroma of hot brake linings

Tired white faces fill the platform at Wigan North Western station 

Patiently waiting to be swallowed by the electric propelled tube

Going home after a long boring day at work

We pull out and pass a cricket field with manicured turf awaiting the white suited players.

They always stop playing at 4pm for tea and cucumber sandwiches

England is so civilized 

The train picks up speed towards Preston

The hills of the Pennines gently roll by 

Train commuters oblivious to the moving canvas of breathtaking scenery

Green fields surround the tracks but the wind swept hill tops are bare

The train carves a path through the once thriving industrial heartland of England

Cotton weaving mills are mostly gone or converted to trendy apartments 

The coal mines closed after Prime Minister Thatcher crushed the industry

Shopping malls replaced factories

Wind turbines fill skies once littered with mill chimneys 

Tourism has outstripped manufacturing industry

Sleepy villages become overloaded with summertime visitors  

White collars outnumber blue collar workers 

The train parallels the A6 road to Scotland

Once a stagecoach route slowly taking passengers by horse

Now congested with BMWs and Range Rovers

Our train pulls into the historic city of Lancaster

Born from a Roman camp on the banks of the river Lune

The ghost riders of forgotten steam trains don’t recognize the changed lands of jolly old England