One of the world's most famous steam locomotives has set off on its inaugural run after a decade-long, £4.2m refit.

Thousands of steam enthusiasts lined tracks and bridges as Flying Scotsman mad the journey up the East Coast Main Line.

So many fans turned up that the journey was initially disrupted by fans standing on the tracks to take photographs.

Passengers said the famous locomotive came to a "shuddering stop" near St Neots, Cambridgeshire, and Virgin Trains East Coast warned that other services were being delayed by up to 15 minutes due to photographers on the track.

British Transport Police received reports of around 60 trespassers on the track near St Neots shortly after 9am but no arrests were made.

Tickets for the famous locomotive’s first Scottish passenger trip for 16 years went on sale earlier this week.

The historic engine will operate separate journeys from Edinburgh on the Borders Railway and over the Forth Bridge to Fife on May 15.

Crowds of people who had secured a vantage point on platform one at London King's Cross were covered in steam as the journey began.

Some 297 VIPs, fundraisers, competition winners and ticket-buying members of the public are onboard for the five-hour trip.

Flying Scotsman has been painted in the traditional early 1960s British Rail green for its first official outing bearing its nameplates after the restoration project.

Built in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, in 1923, it soon became the star locomotive of the British railway system, pulling the first train to break the 100mph barrier in 1934.

The National Railway Museum (NRM) in York bought the locomotive for £2.3m in 2004 before work got under way on its restoration in 2006.

Flying Scotsman will be kept at the NRM until March 6 before embarking on a tour around the country.