Quick! While There's No-one There!

Our first train trip to London since February

Normally, visiting Westminster Abbey is a nightmare, with queues and little opportunity to appreciate the spiritual qualities of the place. I had only been there for services, choosing to avoid visiting it for the history and architecture, both of which are worth a look. But for the moment, in 2020, hardly anyone goes there and in any case the Abbey cannot manage many but desperately needs the income from visitors. So we decided to go while it was quiet, to see the place properly and to do our bit for its upkeep by buying tickets to visit, all pre-booked like virtually everything else in Britain at present. This was to be our first visit to London since all the cancellations in February and we decided to stay one night, have tea at Fortnum & Mason in Piccadilly (they were offering two for the price of one, so it was only expensive rather than extremely expensive) and just enjoy the West End without the crowds.

As a member of Hilton's loyalty scheme I booked a room at the Doubletree Westminster, a few minutes' walk from the Abbey, and First Class tickets with LNER to and from London Kings Cross to connect conveniently with the reduced-frequency trains between Stamford and Peterborough.All was set. Both Cross Country Trains and LNER insist on reservations for travel: with LNER we are given specific seats which we have to use; on Cross Country we can choose any empty seat far enough from other passengers but they will not sell tickets for a train which already has as many as it can take with social distancing. All our train tickets were electronic, held on my iPhone. I am beginning to get the hang of finding them quickly for operating barriers at stations.

The weather forecast was not wonderful: warm enough but wet at times. We took minimal luggage for just one night, one small case between us and walked together to Stamford station. Our train to Peterborough was just a couple of minutes late and our connection to London was easily made, although the temporary "one way" system at Peterborough station really does not work well for connecting passengers. Once the London train was under way I sent to collect our coffee and biscuits from the First Class host, probably not very different from what we would normally have had on such a short trip.

Arriving in London we walked to our hotel in Westminster. A long walk punctuated by a lunch break in a small park, and not quite the shortest route but a more scenic one which took us by the Savoy and along the Embankment. The hotel was having building work done and the main entrance was not in use, so it took us a while to find the way in: it turned out that it only reopened that day after the Covid-19 closure and that we were only the second group of guests to arrive. The restaurants were not open so we would have to have a packed breakfast either in our room or as a take-away; as we had nowhere to take it to we opted to have it in our room and specified a time. We went to our room, unpacked our few things and got ready to go out to tea. The room was looking really tidy and clean: Hilton had been to some effort to combat the virus by extensive cleaning of all rooms. It was looking a bit dated, though, with no device charging points by the bed, unlike our hotel in Edinburgh a few days which had double sockets with double USB points each side of the bed. We wondered if the refurbishment would address this sort of thing.

We set off through the drizzle, which came and went a bit, for the long walk to Piccadilly. By now, tea time, there was very heavy traffic in our street and here-and-there elsewhere, but our route was largely through quiet streets and pedestrian ways, and across St James's Park, all very pleasant. We arrived in plenty of time before our tea booking, and we walked through both Piccadilly and Burlington Arcades and then had a few minutes browsing the goods on offer at Fortnum & Mason before proceeding to the lounge for tea, which compared quite well with the afternoon tea we had enjoyed in Edinburgh less than a week before! As then we had two hours, which was more than enough, and as then we did not need any supper afterwards but rather a long walk ... we even declined the slice of cake which was an option to finish off the meal!

We took the long walk back to our hotel, through the occasional light shower, via Piccadilly Circus, Leicester Square, Trafalgar Square - it felt like the Monopoly board - then along Whitehall and across Westminster Bridge and back over Lambeth Bridge to our hotel off Horseferry Road.

In the morning our packed breakfast arrived and although it was not quite the standard we have come to expect of Doubletree hotels it was all good, and the coffee was excellent. we checked out and left our case at reception to walk the short distance to Westminster Abbey, clutching our printed-out on-line tickets and vouchers for the multimedia guided tour. The queue was minimal and after a quick security check and hand-sanitise we were in and in possession of the devices which would provide us with the guided tour. Photography was not allowed in the Abbey, so this part of the blog will have to go without illustration, but it suffices to say that this building is one of Europe's finest, so do see it if you can. Similarly the history here is amazing: a thousand years of the story of England and her church and monarchy, intertwined, is told here and is better described by others than by me. I recommend the electronic multimedia tour: each talk is short and to the point, it is easy to operate and copes with several languages and is good at reminding us throughout that this is still a working place of worship with a regular round of prayer and praise - although somewhat curtailed at present like all places of worship.

We visited the gift shop and then returned to collect our case from the hotel, bidding a farewell to the receptionist, who was the only other person we met there! She is from Italy which is where we had been going to go this autumn and have rebooked on a date next year.

We then revisited Fortnum & Mason, having noticed the day before that they were offering their knickerbocker glories at two for the price of one ... then we walked that off by going on foot through London to Kings Cross, up Regent Street and Great Portland Street then along Euston Road and taking the signposted walk from Euston to Kings Cross through the middle of St Pancras station. We had a few minutes in the reopened First Class lounge (no refreshments yet, but expected soon) before boarding our LNER train to Peterborough where we changed for Stamford as usual. By then the rain had started but was all right for walking home where hot chocolate made a fitting end to such a day. We had only left the day before but we had enjoyed tea and ice-cream and walked 17 km as well as our object of seeing Westminster Abbey without the crowds. Wonderful!

Five Meet in Dorset

An old-fashioned family adventure by train, bus and ferry

If you want an adventure holiday and enjoyed Enid Blyton’s stories when you were young, The ideal place to stay is a hotel in a time warp in Dorset, a turn-of-the-century house which has been a hotel since the mid-twentieth century, where Enid Blyton used to stay during the period when she was writing many of her children’s books and when she conceived the Noddy stories. The Knoll House Hotel is in unique landscape on the Purbeck peninsula in Dorset, southern England, less than five minutes walk from Knoll Beach which, like much of the coastal landscape of the area, is owned and managed by the National Trust. It makes a great base for exploring on foot, by bicycle, bus or, if you must, by car.

We took our family there as part of the celebration of a significant wedding anniversary; we were eight adults and five young children, in three family suites and our own sea-view double room, coming from several different directions. We went, of course, by train and bus and on this occasion took one of the grandchildren with us on our adventure, the other four going with their respective parents by car. We’d had the hotel rooms booked well in advance but booking the travel and activities was greatly disrupted by the coronavirus pandemic of 2020. For a long time it appeared that we may well have had to drive and there would be little to do other than visit the beach and go for walks. Just in time the restrictions began to be eased and I was able to book train travel and then even book an exciting family outing for one of the days.

We left Stamford, with our four year-old granddaughter, on a Friday morning, the first dull day after several long, hot, sunny days ... such is the way things work out! We were travelling First Class on a CrossCountry train for Birmingham New Street. There were no bargain tickets to be had but at least we had our Senior Railcards and the little girl went free-of-charge; I wanted First Class to make sure of enough space around a table, and electric sockets, especially since I was following pandemic advice and using electronic tickets on my smartphone which needed to keep its charge for a long time while sharing our location with the rest of the family. It all went very well and we had the First Class section to ourselves.

Owing to the reduced timetable we had over an hour to spare at Birmingham New Street so we went into the Grand Central shopping centre to find a cup of coffee between trains, and I have to say I was shocked to see how deserted it was. The John Lewis store there is among those the company has decided not to reopen and some other shops were also not yet open; about half the cafés and restaurants were closed and yet the one we used, Giraffe, had only a handful of other customers. So little activity in the very heart of the Second City was a sobering reminder of the dreadful economic impact of the pandemic. We went back to the station and had our picnic lunch that we had brought with us and then made our way to the platform and boarded our train to Bournemouth. Travelwise this was the most exciting part of the trip for me, for I had long wanted to go this way, through the south midlands from Birmingham, through the New Forest and along the south coast to Bournemouth where we were to take a bus for the final stage of the journey. 

This train ride begins with the slow wander through the edge of Birmingham, Coventry and Leamington Spa in order to serve the airport and National Exhibition Centre at Birmingham International, and then heads down to Oxford and Reading where the train changes direction to take the line south through Basingstoke to Southampton and then Bournemouth. Although the train service is less frequent, the trains are longer and there is no difficulty keeping a decent distance from other passengers: Cross Country does not sell more tickets for a train that the train will be able to take safely. A limited amount of on-board catering has now been reintroduced and we were able to enjoy coffee and biscuits included in our ticket price. Further items were available for payment if we had wanted them, but currently only snacks. It all worked very well and both the trains to Birmingham and onward to Bournemouth were on time. We had a very pleasant journey.

Our little companion was excited to see the aircraft at Birmingham International Airport (plenty on the ground, none in the air at present), and I enjoyed the New Forest countryside, and the short run along the Great Western main line between Didcot and Reading. There is an enormous mix of landscape and cityscape, fast main lines and meandering single-track branches on this route, ending in the impressive station at Bournemouth. Many years ago, trainspotting at New Street in my student days, I used to hear the announcements for these trains which in those days went straight down to Leamington Spa without the detour via the then non-existent International station and went on beyond Bournemouth to Poole, and I always wanted to try this route for its variety and for the length of it. It was never fast but it was always a useful route, and I remember seeing whole carriages reserved for Saga Holidays, filled with people like I am now ...

The view from the open-top bus as we dock at Studland. A similar bus for
Bournemouth is waiting to board.

At Bournemouth we left the train and sought the adjacent bus station. First mistake was leaving via the wrong exit and not seeing the expected bus station head of us; second was crossing to the right exit via the stepped footbridge, not having noticed the ramped subway which would have been much easier with a child and wheeled luggage! Anyway, with only fifteen minutes to go until the departure of our bus (although there was another half and hour later, so it was not critical) we still had plenty of time to get to it, board and pay our fare. Fortunately the thunder and rain which had been forecast only a few days earlier had pushed back until much later and we were able to ride on the top deck of this open-top bus, the Purbeck Breezer, More Bus route 50. This route has a stop right outside the Knoll House Hotel and named after the hotel, so it was as good as a taxi: we boarded it and asked for the Knoll House Hotel and that is where it took us. It is a long ride and an interesting one, right past the popular Bournemouth beach, though the town centre and through the leafy and very expensive residential areas of Branksome and Canford Cliffs, descending right into Branksome Chine, then along the rim of Poole Harbour to Sandbanks (probably the most expensive residential land in the UK) where the bus boards the chain ferry for Studland, the last couple of miles of our journey being through the dunes and heather of Studland before reaching the Knoll House Hotel where the bus stops right opposite the entrance. We were delighted to be met by all the rest of our family who had arrived earlier (they all live nearer than we do) and had all come on this occasion by car (and for some, had endured quite a slog of a journey, although it was quite reasonable for those from London). We reckon we had had the best views of the sea, and especially the ferry crossing, though, from the top of our bus. And all were to enjoy an open-top bus ride the next day.

The three young families had family suites at the back of the hotel, with bedrooms for the adults and the children, with cots for the youngest; this hotel is very much set up for children's holidays and we think that in its early days the children and their nannies were sent here while parents went elsewhere! We had a double room at the front with a balcony overlooking the sea beyond the hotel's extensive grounds, and once we had checked in and unpacked all of us gathered for drinks and then dinner together. With four children under five and one only five there was not much time in any one meal when all thirteen of us were at the table at the same time, but nevertheless throughout the whole weekend of dinners and breakfasts we had a really great time together and I can thoroughly recommend this place for such a gathering: the hotel is used to doing it (there was one group of nineteen people) and the staff are brilliant at coping. After dinner the two over-sixties went for a stroll down to the beach and then retired to bed to be ready for the following day's adventure.

The need to book everything in advance as the nation eases out of the pandemic "lockdown" meant that the weekend could not be spontaneous, and so although I was able to leave Sunday unplanned for the beach or a day out by bus, for example, the programme for Saturday's outing to Corfe Castle had to be tightly planned, often with virtual crossed fingers, in order for it to stand any chance of working. I booked timed entry to Corfe Castle, a National Trust site, for all of us and then attempted to book a Swanage Railway steam train ride from Swanage to Corfe Castle and back but their tickets could not be released until the Wednesday before the planned weekend ... it was a bit-nailbiting but we managed it and I booked two compartments so that the family could travel together. All seats were allocated to individual passengers to ensure social distancing and waiting and boarding were carefully managed both at Swanage and at Corfe Castle to keep people apart as much as possible.

So we all (well, one toddler was asleep so some had to catch us up later, but that is another, boring, story!) gathered at the bus stop on Saturday morning and awaited the open-top bus to Swanage. This section of the route is quite a ride: there are many overhanging trees and some bends and hills and it is an exhilarating trip! At Swanage there is a good, though short, view of the beach before the bus turns towards the town centre and terminates right outside the preserved railway station building. Although I had booked in advance I had to take the email with my booking reference to the ticket office to collect the actual tickets which authorised the party to go onto the platform. The children were all given souvenir tickets by the gate staff which was rather sweet. We watched the train come in hauled by a Battle of Britain class pacific, a huge locomotive for a line and a train like this, then we watched the locomotive uncouple to run round to the other end of the train before we found our reserved compartments and settled ourselves onto the train.

We steamed to Corfe Castle station arriving at a good time for lunch. It was not the warm, sunny day that I had dreamed of while planning the trip but it was dry and not cold, and we followed the advice posted on lamp-posts through the village to picnic in a park off one of the streets, which really worked quite well. We had been to this place a few times before and never discovered the picnic site, but during the pandemic the local council is keen to prevent too many people congregating in the main square outside the castle entrance. We had packed lunches provided by the hotel and then all made our way to the castle itself. As with all National Trust poverties at present this was booked in advance and we simply had to give our names to be admitted (well, my name, as I had booked and paid). We all learnt a lot (well, the younger adults did, but I had a very thorough visit here a few years ago and to me it was a revision session!) and the children enjoyed clambering over the ruins and hearing about the dungeons and the medieval way of life. As usual, from the castle we saw trains coming and going on the preserved railway line below. The weather remained murky throughout, but not cold and with very little rain.

Tea and coffee were consumed before we left the castle, and some of us visited the National Trust shop on the village square and then we made our way in good time to the station, taking the opportunity to visit the little museum there while awaiting the steam train back to Swanage. A slight hitch occurred here when both our reserved compartments turned up occupied by couples who had boarded at the train's starting point at Norden and had not read the reservation information on their tickets: the train's guard turfed them out into their proper places and we took ours - considering that the reservations are part of the Covid-secure regulations on the line, these people were clearly not obeying the government's advice to stay alert.

At Swanage there was time to watch the train, the last steam train of the day, reversing out of the station to its overnight servicing. Two trains were operating that day, the other hauled by a class 33 vintage diesel service, which we saw passing Corfe Castle a couple of times and which will have been making its last run 40 minutes after ours, by which time we were ensconced on the top deck of the next Purbeck Breezer bus back to Knoll House Hotel.

Knoll House's restaurant served yet another great meal. We all agreed that the food at this hotel was excellent, far better than we had expected from the description "family hotel", and the sort of meal you would expect for a special-occasion restaurant meal. Drinks and other extras were charged-for, but the basic dinner was included in the room rate and it was altogether a very good deal indeed. We went for a stroll along the beach at sunset with one of our sons, by which time the view across the sea was a little clearer and the Isle of Wight was visible, along with three cruise ships resting at anchor, unable to operate because of the pandemic.

On the Sunday nothing had been planned and the weather forecast was fairly dire. However, we did agree to go down to the beach mid-morning and after delaying it for half an hour because of heavy rain we did venture out, encountering occasional light showers but remaining reasonably warm (although those who went into the sea were not as warm as those who didn't!). I spent much of the time shuttling off to the National Trust coffee bar watching the morning coffee for the three groups arriving at different times dictated by the sleep patterns of the youngest children ... I think all the adults got their coffee in the end. The first trip to the shop also included plastic buckets for building sandcastles, and one of these went back partly filled with shells from the beach. This really was a very traditional family beach holiday and it was great to enjoy it all together as one big family. At lunch time the younger generations enjoyed a bar meal together at the hotel while we made a snack lunch in our room out of what was left from our packed lunches of the previous two days! There was plenty for the two of us.

In the afternoon each household followed its own agenda, ours being a walk to Studland village across the fields from the hotel, following a signposted bridleway and footpath. From the village we walked down to the beach: this was South Beach, a small, fairly secluded beach for the village, but with a fair number of visitors even though the car park was closed. We walked northwards towards Middle Beach, which segues into Knoll Beach, by means of which we could return to the hotel. We set off encouraged by the sign that Middle Beach could not be reached at high tide, for the tide, although just beginning to come in, was still very low. However, getting to Middle Beach was not exactly a breeze even at low tide, involving scrambling over uneven and slippery rocks and chasing some very muddy sand and fairly stinky seaweed, too. But it was fun, if not easy! After all this effort, actually to land on the sand at Middle Beach still looked like defeating us when we encountered the works being done to repair erosion, but by sidling along a retaining wall we were able to gain the path up to a promenade behind the beach, coming across a handy tea room in the process where we stopped for tea before completing our walk back to Knoll Beach and the Knoll House Hotel, ready for the pre-booked family swim in the little indoor pool (there is a larger outdoor one, too, but this had not been open when the booking was made). Then we just had time to prepare for our last hotel dinner and a final stroll before bed.

Travel money seller in Bournemouth tries
desperately to draw attention to himself
at a time when no-one is going abroad.

On our last morning we all had breakfast together and said our farewells, some of the children reluctant to leave! With one granddaughter we waited for the 09:35 Breezer bus back to Bournemouth via the Sandbanks ferry. The rest of the family was leaving at about the same time by their different ways and we all kept in touch on the way home. None of the children seemed to want to go home, apart from the very youngest who had spent the whole weekend being carried or strapped into one sort of seat or another. We took a bus rather earlier than we needed to catch our train at Bournemouth and had a coffee break before the train, but with the coffee shop on the station being closed we found ourselves in the McDonald's opposite, the already cheap drinks being reduced by the government's "Eat Out to Help Out" subsidy - not that we were looking for a bargain. The train journey home was much as the one out, with our packed lunch supplied by the hotel, having been ordered the evening before, and a rather shorter wait at New Street. It seemed no time at all before we were collecting our luggage and donning our rainwear for the walk home through the darkening weather, with the distant rumble of thunder, arriving just in time before the rain began. It had been a great weekend and the whole family seems determined to do something like it again. For us it was a demonstration that rail and bus adventures can still be done, although the feel is very different without the usual catering, with less frequent trains and with the need to book absolutely everything in advance.

Is It a Bus? Is It a Tram?

The Cambridge Guided Busway

I have been unfortunate enough to need and fortunate enough to receive treatment at the Royal Papworth Hospital over the last couple of years, and this month I attended an outpatients clinic at which I was discharged fit and well. The hospital used to be in the village of Papworth Everard, difficult (although not impossible) to reach by public transport, and mostly I had been taken by car for my treatments and consultations, but it has recently moved to wonderful new premises in Cambridge on the Biomedical Campus where Addenbrookes Hospital has been for many years. This is now a cinch by public transport from my home in Stamford: a train ride and a quick bus connection, but we decided to make a short break of the trip and arranged to stay with friends in the village of Over, a few miles outside Cambridge, after my clinic appointment. We used to live in Over which then had an infrequent and lengthy bu route to and from Cambridge, and although there is still an infrequent service which goes through the village, there is a stop a short walk away on the Cambridge Guided Busway which has fast and frequent buses much like a tram service, and rather than take our car we thought we'd give this a go.

This time my clinic was not until 3 o'clock in the afternoon, but we set off for Cambridge in the morning with the idea of spending some time together, including lunch, in the city and then my wife could shop while I went off to the hospital. We would then reconvene for our visit to our friends, letting them have our ETA when we boarded our guided bus.

For once we did not book our train tickets in advance, for this is a local service to us and there was little to be gained by early booking. We bought Anytime Returns between Stamford, where we live, and Cambridge, giving us complete flexibility over our timing and allowing break of journey if we decided (which we didn't!) to visit, say, Ely, on our way home, and for my wife a PlusBus ticket for the two days - I am now old enough to have free bus travel anyway. We bought coffee and biscuits from the trolley on the train when it came through our carriage just after Peterborough.

We spent the journey completing some of puzzles in The Times and gazing out of the window: the amount of water in the Fens was quite astonishing after the very wet winter we have had, but no flooding except in the wash lands that are intended to flood when rainfall is high. Soon Ely Cathedral was in view, and then the gorgeous view of Ely over the marina as we approached the station. Soon after that we were leaving the train at Cambridge and making our way to the array of bus stops to find the next bus into the city centre. There was one within five minutes and although it crawled a bit through the traffic it was not long before we were dropped right in the heart of the city. We had our lunch at the Michaelhouse café which we have visited before and then walked together to where I would take my bus to the Royal Papworth Hospital.

In the city centre the guided buses look just like any other bus on the streets, with route letters rather than numbers, but the stopping points are few with the intention of making them a little bit faster, I suppose. I waited at the stop and my bus came along, next stop Cambridge Railway Station, back the way we had come, and after the stop there I was surprised to see that the very next stop on the information display was Royal Papworth Hospital, and when it left the rail station the bus was on the guided busway and accelerated up to somewhere over 50 mph, feeling much like a tram. It stopped right outside an entrance clearly provided for the convenience of bus users: I was too early to check in for my appointment! No problem: the waiting area not only had comfortable armchairs but also a workspace with table equipped with electric sockets, and a coffee bar, so I bought coffee, plugged in my MacBook and wrote up my previous blog post! After coffee I took my appointment letter to the check-in terminal and scanned its barcode, answered the ridiculous questions about my racial origin etc (who needs to know that?) and went back to continue by writing, but within a few moments I was called for my ECG and that was the end of blogging for today.

My shadow photographing the bus on which I arrived in the
centre of Cambridge after my hospital visit! 

Once I had seen the consultant I went out to the bus stops and tried to ascertain when and where my bus back to the city would be departing. Information posted was just timetables; a map or a simple, "Buses to the city centre and St Ives from this stop," would have been good. Not everyone who comes here lives and Cambridge and knows what is where ... anyway, I was soon aboard a fast bus for the city centre, shared my location with my wife on WhatsApp and was soon reunited with her. We walked to the bus station at Drummer Street and looked for the next guided bus that would take us to visit our friends. The Bus Checker app on our iPhones is very handy for this sort of thing. When using buses in strange places I would not want to be without it. Even so, the stops here had very good live information and I am sure we'd have been OK. Once through the streets and out of town we joined the busway and zipped through the countryside like a train - not surprising, this is a former railway line, just like many a tramway.

Guided bus from Cambridge bus station arrives at
Swavesey bus stop

We were met by car at the bus stop (or is it a station?) at Sawavesey and driven the short distance to our friends home, handed over our gifts from Lincolnshire and enjoyed their hospitality, and the following morning, after a filling breakfast with them we made our way through the village on foot, streets once familiar when we lived there but now fading in our memory, and then walked to the station bus stop and awaited the next bus through to the rail station in Cambridge for our train home. Not all buses go to the rail station; some, like the one on which we had arrived, terminate at Drummer Street bus station, so we needed one that would go through. Route diagrams and information at the stop made this simple, and we showed our respective passes and boarded. We soon worked out as we approached that rail station that if we hurried we would catch a train home that was scheduled to depart within five minutes of our bus arriving - easy: no need to run, just keep going purposefully!

The train was not crowded and we had good seats together and resumed our Times puzzles as we sped home. The refreshment trolley came to us just as the train left Cambridge: great! We realised that it was four o'clock and we had had no lunch, so filling had our breakfast been, but it was fading now and we were able to enjoy sandwiches and drinks from the trolley at a very reasonable price. We thanked the host for being so timely, although it was, of course, simply good fortune that he was there just at that moment! And so to home: after all that we had done we treated ourselves to a taxi home from the station this time, and it was good to be back and with the prospect of no more appointments at this wonderful hospital, having been made well by their world-class expertise.

First Class from Lincoln

I do not travel to Lincoln as often as I used to do before I retired, but I have kept some interests there and occasionally have to attend meetings in the city. When I had to go this week I booked my tickets in advance so that I could use LNER’s new service between Peterborough and Lincoln, and I even managed to book First Class for the return leg, still saving money on the route I normally used to use via Spalding with East Midlands Railway. Not quite as quick, but I was hoping for rather more comfort than the single-car trains with insufficient legroom used on the other route.

On the way top Lincoln I was travelling Standard Class on one of LNER's legacy electric trains and I bought some lunch at Peterborough station while awaiting my connection. I had to change trains at Newark Northgate on this leg of the journey, so one more change that I used to have to make going the other way: through trains to and from Lincoln by LNER's route are only two-hourly, whereas the little East Midlands trains are slow but hourly. I was pleased at Newark to see that the connecting train to Lincoln, also provided by East Midlands Railway, now had two coaches and consequently was not overcrowded as they often used to be. As this train was going forward from Lincoln to provide the next service towards Peterborough via Spalding I could see that the shortage of coaches on that route was at last being addressed. I need no longer worry on that score if I chose in future to travel by that route.

My train arrived just a little early into Lincoln, as they often do, and I walked across to the bus station to ride up to the Cathedral and then walk round to my meeting, arriving nicely in time.

Early evening  at Lincoln Central

When my meetings were over and it was time to come home I walked down the hill to the station, having plenty of time before my LNER through train to Peterborough. Lincoln station was very busy with people going home from work, college and shopping, with a variety of local and regional trains going to all sorts of places, and not a single-car train in sight! Nor a "Pacer" unit with four-wheeled coaches; every train had improved beyond what we used to see here just a few weeks ago, and then, to cap it all, in came my train to Peterborough, a London-bound LNER "Azuma".


This was a brand-new class 800 5-car set operating a route which has been beefed-up from just once a day to five times, and I had a First Class ticket this time! The train cruised smoothly away from Lincoln station and into the night and I began catching up on email etc which had not received attention during my meetings, and before I knew it the train was stopping at Newark. I had been able to choose my seat reservation when I booked, and I had a single seat with table towards the end of a coach, very peaceful and convenient for the entrance, the luggage rack (which on this trip I did not actually need) and the toilet.

At Newark the diesel engines were switched off as the train was transferring to electric power for the rest of its run to London. On leaving Newark the at-seat catering trolley made its way through first class and I was served sandwiches and white wine - I was to dine at home later so I did not need any more than that, but I do hope the cooked meal was available for those going all the way to London (and I have no reason to believe it was not).

Although Azumas are no faster than the older electric trains in terms of top speed (both are capable of 140mph and restricted to 125 mph by line speed limits), the acceleration is far superior and departures are always quite a thrill; further, any delays are normally made up with very little difficulty and early arrivals are common, until the entire fleet has been updated and the timetable is rewritten to take the better performance into account, that is!

It was a good run and well worth the effort of booking in advance to grab the First Class journey home for less money than I usually pay for Standard! With East Midlands Railway promising a better timetable for its Lincolnshire services from December 2020 and the possibility of one or two more LNER services to Lincoln as well, the county is finally getting something approaching a decent train service. There will still be scope for more improvements, of course, with better trains to Scunthorpe, Grimsby and Cleethorpes badly needed, but whether anything can be done about the east Lincolnshire coast and Boston is another matter.

By Train to the Trains

Full-size exhibit!

The Warley National Model Railway Exhibition

Model Railway Exhibitions vary enormously. There are local club exhibitions held in village or school halls all over the country, bigger ones run by bigger clubs in exhibition centres or at places like racecourses (some of these are commercially sponsored and are quite large as a consequence), and then there's this one, the Warley National. It is Warley club's exhibition but is held in Birmingham at the National Exhibition Centre in one of its large exhibition halls. In spite of the size of the hall, it was crowded when I visited this year and must have had a huge number of visitors. (The whole NEC had rather masculine slant since the other major show there, taking two large halls and some other spaces, was a motorcycle show - there are ladies interested in motorcycles and model railways but they are heavily outnumbered by men!)





So the morning after coming home from Canterbury I was off to Stamford station for a train to Birmingham New Street where I would change for Birmingham International for the NEC. I had through off-peak tickets and went for the 09:05 train, feeling that an early start would be a bit much after the travels of the two previous days. By Nuneaton the three-car Turbostar train's seats were full and there was a large crowd waiting for the train, almost all of whom had to stand, for few left the train there. The guard apologised for the crowding which he attributed to the strike by West Midlands Trains staff, taking place every Saturday for several weeks, which was diverting passengers onto other services, although I could not see how it would put many onto this one.Still, that was how it was and when I arrived at New Street I was cautious about what sort of service I might find to International. There was a handful of West Midlands Trains services operating, but on the line I needed, so I boarded a Virgin Trains London-bound Pendolino which was due to stop at Birmingham International; so had several others, but although the vestibules were packed like sardine cans, there was a lot of standing space completely empty in the interior of each coach, so that was where I stood, excusing my way through the crowd just inside the doors. It is a swift ride to International and then I excused my way back out, then followed the throng up the stairs and eventually to the exhibition hall.

MDMRC members operating Woodcroft

The ticket windows for the exhibition were right in front of those entering from the car parks, but from the station could not be seen without asking the way! The queues for paying by card were immense, but by gathering together enough cash I was able to join one of three much shorter queues and soon paid and was inside.

I began by making my way right across the hall to where I knew my fellow members of the local Market Deeping Model Railway Club were exhibiting our layout Woodcroft which I had been helping to restore and repair after the notorious vandalism of our own exhibition in May.

By the time I had chatted to my friends there it was lunch time and I went to one of the many street food type kiosks around the hall for something to eat and then, after some searching, found somewhere to sit and eat it!

Then a long walk up and down the hall trying not to miss any of the layouts, which varied from tiny one-person shunting or loco shed scenes to huge, multi-operator complex systems with lots of trains moving at the same time.

A Rhatische Bahn station in HOm gauge

I also needed to look at some trade stands and did come away with a few bits and pieces for my planned layout based on the Alpine Rhatische Bahn. I even bought some snow ...

When all was done I paid a final visit to my local friends and then wended my way back to the station to begin the trip home. Again, of course, there were fewer trains than usual because of the local strike, but I did manage to get a Virgin train to New Street before very long, and even to sit down this time. At New Street I had a short wait for my Cross Country train home, but it was time for tea anyway, so I bought something suitable and awaited the boarding time for the train. It was busy, but not overcrowded and before long I was at home unpacking the newly-bought items for the planned layout, the magazines and book I had bought (the book from the Swiss Railways Society, which I joined this year) for technical advice on the Rhatische Bahn and on modelling Swiss railways in general, and the advertising material I had taken from companies whose products may be useful when building commences.

It was a tiring day, but very useful and very interesting. I hope that soon I shall be there exhibiting, either the club layout or even perhaps one of my own.

Wet and Windy, or how we miss the East Lincs Main Line

By train to Boston, Lincs

My route across Lincolnshire! You can easily see where the
route of the East Lincs Main Line used to be

People in Louth, Lincolnshire, say that in the 1960s they could travel by train to London in about the same time as it now takes them to drive to their nearest main line station. The people of Boston may look more fortunate as they still have a railway station, but to get to London from there now involves a fifty-minute ride to Grantham before starting a main line trip of a similar length to the old direct train from Boston itself. The closure of the East Lincolnshire main line between Grimsby and Peterborough was, combined with decline in fishing and in seaside holidays, a catastrophe for the Lincolnshire coast from which it has never recovered. The roads around the area are grossly inadequate for the traffic they are now forced to take, and even the new A16 laid along the track bed of the main line between Spalding and Boston is often overloaded, especially with lorries taking agricultural produce to market, traffic once taken by rail. 

Still, Boston is on the railway and can be reached. So when I had to go there I thought I’d give the train a try. I had to attend a training session in Boston, at 9.30 in the morning in November. It is in the same county but is a difficult drive on busy roads at the best of times, and in rain the journey by road was not a pleasant prospect. To be sure of getting there for the start, I'd have to plan to arrive at 09:00 to allow time for Boston's chronic congestion (probably also a result of having inadequate railways!) and to find a parking space. This would mean leaving at about 07:30, given the slowness of traffic around Spalding and along the A16. That perspective makes the 06:57 departure required to do the trip by train seem a little less daunting, although I did have to walk to the station before then, of course! But then, had I gone by car I'd have had very little exercise that day whereas I actually walked a fair bit one way and another. and exercise matters.

A pleasant surprise. I had no idea that USB
sockets had been fitted to EMR class 158
trains

It was a good day, broadly speaking. There were niggling little delays here and there because of the dreadful weather, but nothing to spoil things; all connections easily made. I bought my tickets in advance using the Cross Country Trains Train Tickets app and had them as electronic tickets on my iPhone, with a print-out just in case, so I did not need time even to pick up the tickets at the station and could just walk onto the train. I had reserved seats from Stamford to Peterborough and back, and between Peterborough and Grantham and back, but there are no reservations available between Grantham and Boston. The total fare, Standard Class Anytime Return was £30.65 with my Senior Railcard. (The mileage would have been £31.50, plus the cost of parking, so I have saved a bit on the expenses claim!) All the trains were warm and dry and I was able to get on with the tasks I had in mind to do on the way there and back - something which would have been out of the question if I had travelled by car. This was helped by East Midlands Railway and LNER trains having USB charging ports at all Standard Class seats: it was only at the stations and the on the section between Peterborough and Stamford on Cross Country Trains where I had to run my
iPhone and iPad on battery power, although on the other hand that was also the only stretch with free WiFi. WiFi was available at all the stations, too. With a fully-charged iPhone I never needed to use the paper tickets I had printed at home, but they were handy to keep in the pocket because they include the itinerary for the trip - very useful with two changes of train each way - and the seat reservation details, so although I never showed them to anyone, I looked at the times and seat numbers at each departure and junction station. That, too, would have been on the iPhone, but it rather more fuss to consult than a folded paper in my jacket pocket.

I had had a rather earlier-than-usual breakfast so I bought a croissant at Peterborough station before boarding the Liverpool-bound train which would take me to Grantham, and at Grantham I had a few minutes to wait for the Skegness train which took me to Boston. These were both comfortable trains with plenty of legroom, quite unlike the dreadful units that run between Peterborough and Lincoln and which I have to use much more often than these. I was on time at Boston and walked through some fairly heavy rain to my course in the town centre - a test for my new raincoat which it passed with distinction! All dried out soon enough during the day.

When it was time to come home I hurried far too quickly to the station and had to wait several minutes for the train. I don't think I had taken in just how convenient Boston station is, and I could have chatted just a little more to colleagues instead of rushing off.

The train back to Grantham stopped at Rauceby signal box (they still have them on that line!) for the signaller to warn the driver that the line was flooded ahead and that the train would have to proceed slowly. In spite of this we were only a few minutes late into Grantham, easily allowing for the connection to Peterborough. I would not be home for dinner as I was intending to go straight to a meeting when I arrived in Stamford,  so I planned to have a snack on the train to Peterborough, which was a LNER "Azuma" scheduled to have a buffet car. I was horrified on arrival at Grantham to see that my train was indicated baldly "Delayed" and with no time shown. I was soon comforted when a two-minute late departure was indicated (although the EMR train behind it was still just "Delayed" - probably yet more flooding). The train was one of the new service from Lincoln, a five-coach Azuma set ideal for this service, and I had my reserved seat. I walked through to the buffet and bought my sandwich and a can of Hop on Board ale which occupied the time to Peterborough: indeed I was still enjoying the beer on arrival there and finished it while waiting for the connection to Stamford.

And so to my evening meeting and eventually home to bed - arriving about fifteen hours after setting off from the station! But all very relaxed, with jobs done.

I was happy that I had made the correct decision to go by rail. Yes, it takes longer than driving, and it involved two changes of train. But it also gave me time to get things done, time to relax, and some exercise. I only got wet once, but then so did those who drove, for the car parks were no handier for the venue than the rail station in Boston. It was good day, a bit of an adventure. really, and as you know by now, I do like a bit of an adventure!

Exciting Trip for Next Summer

Edinburgh

Scotland again, but by a very special train this time

I have just taken the plunge and booked a trip through the Scottish Highlands on Belmond's Royal Scotsman, a very special trip to celebrate a special wedding anniversary next summer. I have also booked a couple of night's at the Balmoral Hotel (formerly the North British) adjacent to Edinburgh Waverley from which the tour departs, and our actual anniversary will be spent there, leaving on the Royal Scotsman the day after.

The trip takes in the Kyle of Lochalsh line, the only line out of Inverness that we have yet to travel, so it all fits in nicely. I look forward tremendously to the experience, and to writing about it afterwards.

Meanwhile there will be other journeys and experiences, of course, beginning later this month with another visit to Bath for a session at the Thermae Bath Spa and just to take life easy at the Royal Hotel. We are taking up a special offer of inclusive dinner with wine at no more than the usual bed-and-breakfast rate - and in all our trips to Bath we have never actually had dinner at the hotel before, so that, too, will be a new experience and will make the trip more relaxing, although less adventurous. It is a measure of how popular the hotel restaurant is that I had trouble booking a table several weeks in advance! Also adding to the relaxing feel of the trip is that I have been able to book reasonably-priced First Class seats with Cross Country as far as Bristol. The whole three days will feel like pampering, but at a budget price! I'll write it up as soon as I get the chance.

In December I have the group outing to Canterbury, too, which should be a grand day out.

Nothing is sorted out for next spring yet, and no beach holiday for the summer, so there is some planning yet to do.

The State Rooms at Buckingham Palace

While travelling home from London on our last visit we noticed an advertisement for an exhibition at Buckingham Palace about the work that Queen Victoria had done there to make it into the modern home and workplace that it is today. We filed it at the back of our minds until our son mentioned that he would be away on business for a couple of days and that we might like to borrow his home again, so a quick look online for tickets on one of those days, followed by a search of the LNER website for cheap Advance First tickets to get there and we were off once more to the capital.

Complimentary refreshments in LNER First
Class on a short trip: wine, fruit and
sandwich. Other options were available.

It so happens that just a few times a day a fast train to London stops at Peterborough at 30 minutes past the hour, connecting beautifully with our train from Stamford, and that these trains are seldom busy and so have both space and plenty of cheap tickets. So we found our selves on the 14:30 to London and the journey was perfect: plenty of space in our seats; power sockets that worked; complimentary food trolley came round even before the train had left the station, closely followed by hot and cold drinks; friendly and efficient staff who looked after us well. We did leave Peterborough a couple of minutes late but we were in no hurry and I did not notice whether we were late on arrival.

This was a short trip in summer and we combined our luggage in one small wheeled case, so there was little need for step-free routes and I was able to carry everything straight down to the Hammersmith & City Line Underground platforms at Kings Cross, and sitting near the correct end of the train we were down the stairs at our destination in no time and soon letting ourselves into our temporary home. Having had lunch at home before we left for the station, we had not needed all of the food provided for us on the train, so this did well for a light supper.

The following morning we were up bright and (reasonably) early and after breakfast walked to a stop to get a bus to Buckingham Palace, allowing plenty of time for things to go wrong and for traffic hold-ups on the way. The bus is nothing like as quick as Underground train, even if there are changes of train, but it is generally a more pleasant ride and we do get to see something of London. I don't think there was anything on this route, the 148, that we had never seen before, but it was nonetheless a great ride, going through some of London's loveliest residential streets and past Kensington Gardens, Hyde Park and the grand hotels of Park Lane. Further, the ride was quite swift and simple and we were well ahead of schedule, so we stayed on past our expected stop as far as Victoria Street, opposite Westminster Cathedral, and went for a walk along Broadway, through the modernist extravagance of St James's Park station to and around the park itself, including a walk along Horse Guards Parade - the only guard we saw was the armed police office at the rear of 10 Downing Street. The flower borders in St James's Park for spectacularly beautiful and we seemed to be seeing them at the very best time, with almost everything in full bloom.

In the distance we could hear the sound of a military band, and as we neared The Mall we saw a contingent of marching troops in ceremonial uniform entering from a side street. Meanwhile large crowds, including many escorted parties, were beginning to gather. The Changing the Guard ceremony was taking place at the palace, and our 11:30 timed-entry ticket meant that we would be passing the front of the palace on our way to the side gate in the midst of this crowd-drawing spectacle. Visitors to London from all over the world will have come to these few street just to watch this hour-long piece of traditional pageantry. We managed to get past the crowds and to cross the road without inconveniencing any marching bands, and although we did not know this end of the palace grounds at all well it was fairly obvious where the entrance to the State Rooms was and we soon joined the small crowd of people entering for the 11:30 start. The Queen Victoria exhibition is simply woven into this year's opening of the State Rooms, so an ordinary ticket to visit those rooms is all that is required, and then as you go round there is extra information and additional artefacts relating to the life and work of Queen Victoria.

Photographs are not allowed, so I cannot show you any here, but I will say that these rooms are well worth seeing. You do not have to be an ardent monarchist or historian, but an interest in British culture or in architecture and design will be well satisfied here. There are many rooms open, and personal headsets are available free of charge to give a commentary and further information as you round at your own pace. If you want to study all the paintings in the Royal Collection, you can take all the time you want, but in the unlikely event that you are bored by these you can just walk through and enjoy the spectacle of the building. The profits from these public openings go to maintain this art collection, and part of the purpose of opening this rooms is to allow the public to see the works of art.

Exit was through the famous Buckingham Palace garden where we had been several years ago at one of Her Majesty's summer Garden Parties, but now the terrace along the back of the palace was host to a café where we enjoyed an excellent lunch, and where the tea tent had been for the Garden Party there was a large souvenir shop, where we bought little gifts for the two grandchildren whose parents had kindly lent us their home for this trip. On the way out we also took time to visit an ice-cream stall by the lake (did I mention that we'd also had a Bertotti's ice-cream the previous evening? No? Well, we did: this ice-cream lark is becoming a habit so ingrained I do not always remember it ...). Back out on the street we took the bus back "home" via a brief shopping trip, mostly to get something to cook for dinner, and our amazing day out was over. Our tickets are valid for 365 days, so if we can return to London on a day the State Rooms are open any time in the coming 364 days we can ring for a time slot and repeat the visit if we wish.

On Saturday I had a small task to do, involving a walk to the Royal Mail office a short distance away, and then I went for a longer walk with no destination in mind, with the intention of returning with something interesting for lunch ... I finished up at the whole foods market in Kensington High Street, on the ground floor of the former Barkers department store. On the way I passed Olympia where people were queuing for the current event, Drag World. Looking at the queue it was clear that this was nothing to do with drag racing but with dressing-up, and while the majority of attendees seemed to be dressed normally (although you could not always tell whether they were dressed in the usual clothes for their sex, of course), quite a lot were very flamboyantly dressed and made a colourful spectacle. I could not help wondering just what might be on display at Drag World, being well outside my life experience, but it was clearly a very large niche and seemed very popular with all sorts of people, including families.

After my lunch-buying trip I caught a bus back to my temporary home and after lunch we packed, locked up, left gifts for our absent hosts and made our to the Underground for the trip home. Our LNER train left Kings Cross bang on time and got us to Peterborough where we had time to buy a few necessities from Waitrose before taking the connecting train to Stamford. On the platform were several Ipswich Town football supporters fresh from their 2-2 draw with Peterborough United and waiting for their train which was due to leave two minutes before ours. There was a heavy police presence for crowd control and although all the fans I saw were very well-behaved their mere presence might have been alarming for some. By the time our train left it was clear that things were not going well: on the opposite platform the train to Ipswich, just three coaches like ours, was not going to cope with all the intending passengers; this was not a special and there were many other folk aboard including children, all squashed into their places and the lobbies overcrowded while some football supporters were still on the platform. The police were having heated discussions with one group as our train pulled out so I do not know what became of those who would not be able to get on this train. It is only an hourly service and some of the trains are even shorter than that one; it is not a service designed for heavy flows of football fans on match days, and yet such capacity problems were easy to predict. Our own train came into Peterborough heavily laden with Newcastle supporters who were changing trains at Peterborough on their way home - a large crowd leaving the platform as the large crowd of Ipswich fans arrived - all good-natured but simply too many people for the trains and platform to cope with. Most Newcastle fans, knowing they had some time to wait, simply stood around until things eased off with the departure of the trains at the platform.

And so home, unpacking once more and preparing for our next trip! Watch this space ...

So we meet again, Mr Bond

Another train trip to London, with a secret mission!

As I have mentioned before, we do seem to go to London rather a lot at present, but it has come to a peak this summer when we managed to have just one complete day at home between visits to the capital. Fortunately the weather was sunny and warm and we managed to wash and dry our clothes before setting off again.

This trip was a while in the planning (unlike the hastily-arranged one from which we'd just returned) and began with a message before Christmas from one of my London-based offspring to the effect that they'd like to give us a present which would require us to be in London for a night and needed to consult our diary. Meanwhile another sent me a link to Secret Cinema asking if it was the sort of thing that might interest me as a present .... putting the clues together I wondered if they were both thinking of the same thing so I suggested that they speak to each other. The result was two VIP tickets on an available evening in July to a Secret Cinema immersive screening of the James Bond film Casino Royale. I cannot say anything about the location of the event for fear of spoiling it for others who attend, but I shall describe something of the experience. However, there was another (welcome) complication first!

Our son who had first suggested the Secret Cinema event found himself and his family invited to a baptism abroad and offered us the use of his house in London for a week, although unfortunately it did not quite cover the night needed for the screening so we had to add a night in a hotel, but it did make another London break which would give us a chance to visit some more of the less well-known places we had begun to see on our visit a couple of months earlier. Once the dates had been decided, fitted in between the Windsor steam train booking and the Secret Cinema booking, with the day at home and a haircut (!), I was still able to book cheap Advance First Class tickets on LNER to London  and off we set.

The luggage was interesting: the weather forecast was warm and dry, starting with some hot, sunny days, but as well as the summer shirts, shorts and other lightweight things I also needed evening wear for the immersive Casino Royale evening, and my wife needed a suitable dress for it. I had never travelled with evening wear before, but it might be good practice for some of the tours we are planning for the next couple of years.

The day we arrived was very hot and we were fairly tired after our travel, perhaps not assisted by the generous amount of wine we had as our complimentary refreshment on the LNER Azuma up to London! We had left Peterborough at 14:10 after having lunch at Sundays, the restaurant at Peterborough Cathedral, which we can thoroughly recommend - if you're hungry: generous roast dinner for two with drinks for under £25.

On Friday we visited the National Trust property at Osterley Park, walking to Hammersmith for the Piccadilly Line to Osterley, a gorgeous little 1934 station on the Great West Road, then walking round to Osterley Park. One really great thing about walking to these places is the "accidental" things we find on the way, and in this case we stumbled upon a disused station on the Piccadilly Line near the shops at Osterley - now I had always thought the line was built in the 1930s and that the present station was the only one that had ever been here, but apparently not: it was once part of the District Railway. To me it remains a mystery why they moved the station out of the town centre in 1934! Maybe they wanted a higher profile on the new Great West Road?

Osterley House

Osterley House was a "party house," as one of the guides described it. meant to impress guests rather than to dwell in, and it certainly impresses, especially from the front. It was the property of the Child banking family, given to the nation early in the twentieth century and later handed by the Ministry of Works to the National Trust for posterity. It is set in great parkland with some lovely gardens and although some of the house is only available for visit by guided tour much of it can be seen "free-flow" and the parkland is available without charge. We had a great lunch at the restaurant in the stables before our tour of the house and gardens and then made our way back to the station, calling on the way at a little farm shop on the Trust land for some very high quality vegetables and salad - a bit heavy to carry home but worth the effort for the next few days' meals.

Walking back from Hammersmith station we called at a little ice-cream parlour which we'd visited a few years before, just to round off the day. We did not need much supper ...

Isle of Dogs seen from Greenwich. The once-dominant 1
Canada Square (with pyramid roof) now just one of many
tall buildings

On Saturday I had most of the day to myself and set off by Underground and Docklands Light Railway to Greenwich. It had been a long time since I had been that way and I was bowled over by how much development had taken place on the Isle of Dogs: the three towers which once dominated the skyline at Canary Wharf were now surrounded by other towers of similar height, and others were under construction. New flats were taking over much of the land to the south towards Island Gardens. Soon my light railway train plunged into the tunnel under the Thames and I emerged from the underground DLR station at maritime Greenwich. After looking back over the river to see the skyline through which my train had just snaked, I set off to explore the area of the former naval college and other buildings which make up the famous symmetrical layout of the Greenwich townscape. The grounds of the former College, much of it now Greenwich University, were being prepared for a concert that evening, part of a series sponsored by Viking Cruises, and a huge cruise liner was anchored in the river off Greenwich. A varied and impressive line-up of performers was advertised but all I saw was workmen, technicians and caterers setting up for the evening. Many parts of the buildings were open to the public and I made a note to return some time when we were together; for today I would just enjoy the walk through the famous spaces and among the buildings.

I did eventually venture into the National Maritime Museum just to see whether it might be of interest (it was!), for admission is free so a long visit to see everything is not necessary - and there was a great café there and by now I needed some coffee! I looked at one gallery on the East India Company, a subject that has always interested me, how a trading company can find itself governing  nation, and left all the others for a future visit. At least a whole day is going to be necessary at Greenwich, and that's without queuing for the Cutty Sark (which I visited about 53 years ago when more of it was original, before the disastrous fires).

We reconvened late in the afternoon and visited the other branch of the same ice-cream shop as the day before, and then went home to cook our dinner ... another great day was ending.

An Exploration

On Sunday we worshipped at the local parish church and then took the District Line down to the end of the line at Richmond, from where we caught a bus to Ham to visit the National Trust property Ham House and Gardens. Ham House is full of paintings and other artwork and much original décor and was inhabited until the mid-twentieth century and witnesses to the history of the family who lived there.

Incidentally, the CityMapper smartphone app is great for planning public transport routes in areas you do not know: we do know this area to some extent so we did not follow everything it suggested, but it did give us the bus routes to use, in conjunction with information from the National Trust website. On our way to Ham House from the bus stop we passed a signpost pointing not just to Ham House but also to "Foot Ferry to Twickenham", just slightly further away, so after looking all around the available rooms of the house and as much of the garden as we wanted to see (fitting in a decent lunch and yet another ice-cream!), we sought out the ferry landing stage in order to go back a different way.

I do like these unplanned "adventures", especially on warm, sunny, Sunday afternoons. The ferry was small and took twelve passengers but the queue was short and we were taken on the first sailing following our arrival there. It operates on demand and at the time we were there there was a constant demand and it performed a shuttle service at just £1 per passenger.

Awaiting the ferry across the Thames

Marble Hill House

One side advantage to this unexpected detour was that it included a walk through the grounds of Marble Hill House, an English Heritage property on our list of places to visit but which we had not anticipated being able to fit into this trip! We still could not go into it for the time was so late by now, but it is undergoing a bit of work at present and so is best left for another occasion. I knew Marble Hill House was almost opposite Ham House across the Thames but had not known that there was a ferry allowing both to be visited in one outing. from Marble Hill we took a bus back to Richmond and then the District Line home to Hammersmith. I hardly dare mention that I succumbed to uxorial urging to visit the local ice-cream shop one more time! We did not eat much that evening.

Back to Kew, without the queue

The weather forecast for the Monday was not so good, but then it had not been so good for Sunday either, and that turned out OK, so we took a chance on the Monday being similar and decided we should go to Kew Gardens that day, a visit we wanted to make during this stay in London and the price of which had been given as one of my wife's birthday presents. So we booked online before we set off, both receiving a discount and avoiding the queue which we had suffered on the last visit (although we did not expect it to be so bad this time, a weekday in term time). Kew Gardens is so easy by train, with three gates within easy reach of a station; for us the District Line Underground serving Kew Gardens station was the easiest, and for some it would be Richmond or Kew Bridge (South Western Railway) or the Overground to Kew Gardens. We first visited the Palm House and after coffee walked though the newly-planted area which formed part of an enormous project to categorise plants using data now available from their DNA, and then visited the Princess of Wales Conservatory, which had been closed when we last visited and which had some amazing water-lilies among many other fascinating plant exhibits and a few fish and aquatic animals.

Restored dragon at the pagoda

Lunch was at the newly-opened Pavilion restaurant, enjoyable once we got the hang of how and where to order, great quality food and pleasant outdoor dining area, but not cheap. Then came the Temperate House and a visit to the famous Pagoda, newly opened to the public and with its dragons restored after many decades. A sight to behold, and apparently a brilliant view from the top but I dared not risk my health on such a climb and had to leave that to others. I'll get there one day, I hope.

After a cup of tea and a visit to the art galleries and gift shop it was time to return, via M&S for some smoked salmon to make a light supper, and then rest after a lot of walking. Come to that, we had done a lot of walking every day of this holiday, and although tired each evening we feel a lot better for it.

A walk over Hampstead Heath

Tuesday was the last complete day of of our break before we moved on to our pretend MI6 secret mission to the reopening of the Casino Royale at Montenegro. The weather was just right for our planned trip to Kenwood, which involved a train ride on the London Overground to Hampstead Heath station and then a walk of over a mile across the glorious heath to Kenwood. It was a wonderful walk: I have long wanted to see Hampstead Heath and this walk was such an important aspect of the trip to Kenwood that I had not really given a lot of thought to what we would find when we got there! 

Rembrandt's portrait of the artist

I knew it was a large and impressive house overlooking the Heath (and had overlooked London before the trees grew so high!) but I had not taken in just how significant its art collection is. This is not so much a house as an art gallery with a very important collection of painting by well-known artists such as Rembrandt, Reynolds, Gainsborough and Turner. We were bowled over by many of these magnificent paintings, and what's more were allowed to photograph them. The reason is that the house and its artworks were bequeathed to the nation by its last owner, Edward Cecil Guiness, 1st Earl of Iveagh, and it is stipulated that access should be free of charge - so it is a constant drain on English Heritage's funds but a constant joy to lovers of art and architecture. The Earl, heir to the Guinness fortune, bought it to display some of his art collection and wanted that too continue after his death; his purchase of the house prevented it being demolished for redevelopment when the Murray family who had owned it for some generations, disposed of it on their return to Scotland. Upstairs is another art collection from the Earls of Suffolk, mostly of Jacobean subjects. And housing all this is a house remodelled by Adam! This is a place really not to be missed, and is free to enter as well. If you do not fancy the walk across the Heath, buses do get nearer than trains but I have not experienced these so I cannot comment on them.

We had both coffee and a light lunch (although "heavier" meals are available) at Kenwood and after seeing all we wanted we made our way back over the Heath by a different route to the station and back to our temporary home for dinner. And so began the preparations for moving on the next day, hoping it would not be too hot for comfort in my Black Tie outfit for Casino Royale!

And so the following morning we packed our bags, tidied the house and wrote our thank-you card then set off for our hotel for the next night: Hammersmith & City Line to Whitechapel station then walk round the corner to The Whitechapel Hotel. I had never really been to Whitechapel before and as a one-time town planner was interested to see it in the midst of a transformation from one of the cheapest properties on the Monopoly board to a thriving urban centre. The station is currently a bit of a mess: already an interchange between Underground and Overground it has an Elizabeth Line (Crossrail) connection going in as well - if they ever get it finished - and this is probably part of the reason for the place's attractiveness

Our hotel was a new, boutique, hotel in New Road and we had one of their fourth-floor "executive king rooms", small but reasonably well-appointed. We showered (second shower of the day, for it was hot) and changed into our evening wear ready to meet M, Q and all the rest at a mystery venue in east London. Over the weeks approaching the event we had been sent several email messages couched in suitably secret agent type language hyping up the "importance" of our "mission" and advising us to dress in black, white and our "departmental" colour. We had answered an online questionnaire which purported to be sorting out which department we would be in, and therefore which colour we should wear, but I think everyone with a VIP ticket got Control Department and gold; our gift was a pair of VIP tickets and so we dressed with gold accessories. I had always wanted a gold-coloured pocket-handkerchief so this was my chance to acquire one, along with other bits and pieces in the "mission kit" from the Secret Cinema's online shop.

We also had to choose a time to start and we went for 18:15, a bit after the 18:00 opening but, we hoped, early enough to see and do all that was available, and we had to adopt an alias, a person we were pretending to pretend to be (!), and we went as Jacob Bolt and Jenna Buckingham (all the available names began with J & B). We were given a meeting point at a station in east London, which is how we chose Whitechapel as a place to stay, and so when the evening finally arrived and we were all dressed in evening wear fit for a casino, with gold accessories, we set off by train for the rendezvous station which, being top secret, I cannot tell you even now. As the journey wore on and passengers came and went we saw a smartly-dressed couple, he in a purple bow tie and she in purple gown so we had an inkling that they were going the saw way ... and then I saw a couple with matching green accessories, then red, then another green ... no more gold, though. When we got off the train the platforms awash with people in evening wear with coloured bits and pieces and as we made our way to the street there was no way this was a secret gathering as scores of us joined a long line of people being led through unlikely streets to a secret cinema. There are no photographs for we were not allowed the use of cameras or telephones during the evening, our smartphones sealed into pouches for the duration of the event!

At the ticket check we were ushered into a small entrance labelled "Gold Club Members Only" and were given a pack of things including our vouchers for a meal and for two drinks, then we were shown inside. I cannot give you all the details of what we experience, but I can say that the team put on a very good show of pretending that we were on a mission. We could participate as much or as little as we liked, and there was a "world" to explore as this vast space contained all sorts of scenarios with appropriate food and drink available in each one. We had, of course, martinis in the VIP Club bar (where we met M and Q) overlooking the airport, but we had our meal in Madagascar ... As the grand "reopening of the Casino Royale" was interrupted by an event I cannot tell you about the "mission" was "suspended" and we moved into our seats for the showing of the film. Our two-person VIP seats had goody bags on them and bottles of water, and drinks were served at our seats to order - I had to pay for these as we had used our vouchers by this stage - and as the film was shown, various parts of the action were also acted out in the auditorium. At the end of the film we could have stayed on for further drinks had we wished, but we took the train back to our hotel, late enough as it was. At the station the platform was heaving with people from the Secret Cinema: we had arrived in a phased manner but most left at the same time. An almost empty train came in and it left jam packed! People boarding at intermediate stops were amazed that there was standing room only on a train after 11pm. Back to our room, third shower of the day and bed. What an amazing evening it had been!

Waiting for the food! Fortum & Mason

And so home. The following morning we dressed and packed in a leisurely manner and made our way by Underground back to Kings Cross St Pancras and had our breakfast at Fortnum & Mason at St Pancras. this was not the cheap option, at about four times the price of breakfast at our hotel, but it was a very special treat at the end of a great week, and it was handy for the train home.

Workspace in the First Class Lounge at
London Kings Cross

We went over to Kings Cross and tried out the newly-refurbished First Class Lounge which was a huge improvement on the cheap, flimsy and, frankly, silly makeover which Virgin Trains East Coast had done a few years before. There were many comfortable places to sit and the space looked much more efficiently used, so I expect that they also fitted in rather more waiting passengers than before, as well as accommodating in more comfort. We went for a cosy little space for two, but there were larger spaces for larger groups, tables and chairs for those who wanted them, and partly-screened carrels for those who wanted to work or study, with plenty of power outlets and USB charging sockets.

When our train, the 12:30 to Newcastle, was called it turned out to be a diesel High Speed Train instead of the expected electric train so all the seat reservations were in unexpected places but the train staff had done their best and we were directed to our seats efficiently and caringly. A sandwich and wine were served before we changed trains at Peterborough and made our way home. As we went to bed after an evening unpacking and tidying away it was hard to believe that previous night we had been at the Casino Royale with James Bond ... we had, hadn't we? Or had we?