Leaves on the line
5th Sep 2005, 15:35 GMT
We are standing on the lovingly restored platform of Alresford station in Hampshire, six miles from Winchester. A 1940s steam train, the carriages painted in fetching Southern Region green, puffs happily as it pulls away from the platform, past flower boxes and vintage posters advertising Imperial Airways and Batey's lemonade. Today, the service takes tourists on an hour-long trip to Alton and back. But for almost 100 years, from the 1860s, this was the Watercress Line which carried freshly picked watercress on a journey that ended at Covent Garden.