Where to See Flying Scotsman in 2026 and 2027

Nothing else on rails pulls a crowd like Flying Scotsman. When 60103 visits a heritage line, the car park fills by nine, every bridge for miles sprouts tripods, and small children who have never heard of Nigel Gresley point at the apple green engine like it is a celebrity. Which, fairly, it is.

This page is the confirmed diary: every public appearance for 2026 and 2027 that an operator, a heritage railway or the National Railway Museum has actually announced, checked against the announcement itself. We verify weekly and flag new dates in the Thursday Runsheet. Rumours, 'expected' visits and hopeful forum threads do not make the list.

As of the end of September 2026, three mainline dates in September have come and gone, two more mainline days follow in October, then a Dorset half-term finale at Swanage and Flying Scotsman's first-ever visit to the Weardale Railway in County Durham in November. For 2027, nothing is announced yet, and we say so rather than guessing.

Why 60103 matters

Flying Scotsman was built at Doncaster in 1923 for the London and North Eastern Railway at a cost of £7,944. Nigel Gresley designed it as an A1 Pacific for the heavy East Coast expresses, and the LNER, never slow to spot a publicity opportunity, sent it to the 1924 British Empire Exhibition at Wembley wearing the name of its most famous train, the 10am King's Cross to Edinburgh service.

Two dates made it immortal. On 1 May 1928 it hauled the inaugural non-stop Flying Scotsman service, London to Edinburgh in one go, 392 miles, using a corridor tender so a relief crew could climb through mid-run. Then on 30 November 1934, on a test run down Stoke Bank, it became the first steam locomotive officially recorded at 100mph. City of Truro's 1904 claim is older but was never properly authenticated, which is why the plaque sits on Scotsman.

British Railways renumbered it 60103 in 1948, which is why the museum insists on that number today. Alan Pegler bought it straight out of BR service in 1963, toured it round America until the money ran out, and later owners took it to Australia in 1988, where it set a 422-mile non-stop record for steam. The National Railway Museum bought it for £2.3m in 2004 after a public appeal, and after a decade-long overhaul it returned to steam in 2016. The museum owns it outright and contracts specialist operators to run it on the main line and at heritage railways; check railwaymuseum.org.uk/flying-scotsman for who currently holds that contract.

The confirmed diary: the rest of 2026

These are the appearances confirmed by operators, each checked against the operator's own announcement before it goes in. Three mainline days and a month-long Shildon residency have already run this year; see 'Where it has already been in 2026' below for those. If it is not listed here, it is not confirmed.

• 14 October 2026: Coleshill Parkway (Chesterfield pickup) to York, diesel-hauled outward with Scotsman on the return leg, arriving back at Coleshill Parkway at around 22:50. From £99 standard class, promoted by Fox and Edwards Events.
• 17 and 18 October 2026: Didcot Parkway circular tours, a 133-mile run via Reading, Chippenham, Westbury and Swindon with a pause at Newbury Racecourse station. Morning (11:00) and afternoon (15:25) departures on both days. From £99 standard class.
• 23 October to 1 November 2026: Swanage Railway, Dorset, part of the line's 50th anniversary celebrations. Static display 23, 26, 27, 30 and 31 October; hauling passenger services between Swanage, Corfe Castle and Norden on 24, 25, 28, 29 October and 1 November. Book at swanagerailway.co.uk.
• 13 to 15 November 2026: Darlington to Stanhope on the Weardale Railway, Scotsman's first-ever visit to the line. Two departures a day (08:40 and 13:40), each around 4 hours including a photo stop at Stanhope. Traditional class from £79, first class from £129, at foxandedwards.com.

Where it has already been in 2026

For a sense of the pattern, here is the year so far. February brought two-hour Pullman dining trips out of Birmingham to Stratford-upon-Avon with Vintage Trains. March was the Watercress Line in Hampshire. A residency at the National Railway Museum in York ran through late March and into April, then the Great Central Railway (Nottingham) at Ruddington hosted it from 16 to 31 May, its first visit to that heritage line. Early June meant displays and dining trains at the East Lancashire Railway, plus a static display appearance in Doncaster, its birthplace, alongside other visiting locomotives. August brought a residency at Locomotion in Shildon, with static display and short passenger runs on selected days along a stretch of the original Stockton and Darlington route, free to enter. September opened the autumn mainline season: Derby to York and on to Scarborough on the 16th, a Birmingham-area run to Bristol and on to Minehead on the West Somerset Railway on the 19th (which sold out), and a Chesterfield to York and York to Newcastle day on the 23rd (steam-hauled both ways to and from Newcastle, with a diesel return leg to Chesterfield; also sold out).

That is the shape of a Scotsman year: a couple of long museum residencies, a handful of heritage line visits, and short, intense bursts of mainline running. Expect 2027 to look similar.

What about 2027?

Honest answer: nothing is confirmed for 2027 yet. As of the end of September 2026, no operator, heritage railway or the National Railway Museum has announced a single 2027 date. That is normal rather than worrying. The full 2026 programme was only announced in February 2026, so expect the 2027 diary to emerge in dribs and drabs from late 2026 onwards, usually heritage lines first, mainline excursions later.

The museum's plan is for the engine to keep working well beyond 2027, so more visits are all but certain, even though none is booked in yet. Two cautions while you wait. First, ignore any website selling '2027 Flying Scotsman tickets' before an operator has announced anything; resale mark-ups and outright fake listings both exist. Second, every visit is always subject to the engine staying fit, and big engines occasionally miss dates. The official diary lives at railwaymuseum.org.uk/flying-scotsman, and we check it, the promoters and the host railways weekly. New dates go in the Thursday Runsheet the week they turn real.

How tickets work

There are three different ways to see it, with three different booking systems, and mixing them up is the classic mistake.

Mainline excursions are sold by the promoter, currently Fox and Edwards Events. Standard or traditional class fares run from around £79 to £99 on most dates, rising through first class to full Pullman-style dining. Dining sells out first, often months ahead; standard class holds on longer. Always check which legs are steam-hauled, because diesel positioning moves are a normal part of these tours and nobody enjoys discovering one on the day.

Heritage railway visits are booked with the host railway, not the museum. Expect a premium on normal fares: travel tickets to ride behind the engine, cheaper options to view it on shed or static display, and on some visits a small number of footplate experiences sold separately (Great Central (Nottingham) ran timed footplate visits during its May 2026 stay). For families this is the value option, a fraction of mainline prices, and one ticket usually lets you watch it run past all day.

Museum residencies are the cheap seats. Entry to both the National Railway Museum in York and Locomotion in Shildon is free, with advance timed booking sensible on busy days. If you just want a child to stand next to the thing, this costs you nothing but the car park.

Photography etiquette, and how not to stop the job

The hard rule first. On the national network, staying off the railway is not etiquette, it is law. Shoot mainline runs from stations, bridges and public footpaths, never from the lineside, which needs a Network Rail permit. During the 2016 comeback run, trains were halted because people stood on the East Coast Main Line for a photo, and every incident like that makes the next tour harder to run. Use Realtime Trains to follow the working on the day, arrive early, and assume every decent bridge will already have twelve tripods on it.

On heritage lines the rules are gentler but real: stay behind the yellow line, keep small hands held on platforms, and fly drones only with the railway's written permission. Once you have your shot, step back and let the six-year-old at the fence have the front-row view. Their day matters more than your fourth identical frame. On footplate visits, ask the crew before photographing them; almost all will say yes and most will pose.

Practical notes

Shildon is free entry and an easy day with a pushchair whenever Flying Scotsman is next in residence there; check the running-day calendar first if you want to see it move rather than just gleam. For Swanage in October and November, use the Norden park and ride at the top of the line, because parking in Swanage itself is scarce during the visit, and the classic photograph is the train passing below the ruins of Corfe Castle, best from the village side or the hillside viewpoints.

For any mainline day, you do not need a ticket to enjoy it. Pick a calling point like York or Newbury Racecourse and you get the arrival, the crowds and the engine simmering at the platform for nothing. If you are riding, legs that include a seaside stop or a racecourse pause while the engine is watered and turned are usually a better deal than they sound on paper.