As 2021 draws to an end, many of us I am sure will have stayed local because of the continued difficulties with foreign travel. My wife and I have confined ourselves to occasional weeks away around England, revisiting some classic attractions which may already be very familiar to you. What follows, in our last post from 2021, is a checklist of our favourites…
The first heritage railway event of the year, now that outdoor attractions are allowed to open again. An entire weekend of steam, with each day offering over 96 miles of steam haulage behind seven different locomotives!
Continue reading “‘Spring Steam Up’ at the Severn Valley”
Lockdown has prompted a series of DIY requests from my other half, including the announcement at the very start of April that “I want a marble finish in the bathroom!” But where to get some suitable paint? As luck would have it, our nearby Derbyshire town of Belper is home to the only factory in the world producing marble-coloured paint. So this morning I paid them a visit.
Continue reading “Derbyshire Days – Thornton’s Marble Paint Factory at Belper”
Another ‘Great Western’ adventure, as I return to the Severn Valley Railway for the first time since lockdown. How will they have adapted to the new COVID world, and what will the visitor experience be like?
Can you imagine Crich Tramway Village hosting a weekend visit by a vintage Eastern Bloc car rally? It’s a transport junkie’s dream come true, so I went along to take a look!
A relaxing week away with the dogs, staying at a cottage in the Dorset countryside. Having sold our caravan earlier in the year, the first step in our UK holiday planning was to find dog-friendly self catering accommodation. We soon settled on Pippins, a pretty little cottage outside Dorchester, spotlessly clean inside and with lots of thoughtful welcoming touches provided by the owners.
Our heritage railways are gradually reopening now that lockdown is being eased. So I visited the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway in West Yorkshire, to see what changes have been necessary to their visitor experience.
With lockdown gradually easing in the UK, our heritage railways are considering how to reopen safely. One of the first to do so is the Great Central Railway at Loughborough, so I spent the day experiencing their ingenious solutions.
With lockdown taking its heavy mental toll, and Boris promising to reopen the UK holiday trade on 4th July, we had already booked ourselves a space in advance at a campsite on the Wye valley outside Bakewell, ready for a long overdue change of scenery.
A bright Sunday afternoon, visiting the 9-mile Ecclesbourne Valley Railway just a few miles north of Derby centre. This restored branch line from Duffield to Wirksworth once carried local quarry traffic, and visitors can now travel on heritage trains along the pretty river valley.
Continue reading “Derbyshire Days – The Ecclesbourne Valley Railway”
On the 14th October anniversary of the Battle of Hastings, a rather overdue post with plenty of holiday photos from our own conquest of the Sussex coast by caravan this summer!
Visits to Bexhill on Sea, Hastings, Battle, Biddenden Vineyards, Brighton, Wilmington, Pevensey and Rye.
Our attention was recently caught by an advert for a steampunk event at the Great Central Railway in Leicestershire. Steampunk is a Victorian Sci-Fi genre, inspired largely by the technology of the Industrial Revolution during the 19th Century. So, what better setting for such an event than a heritage railway with its own late-Victorian influences. We ordered our tickets straight away!
Places I've Been and Things I've Seen 