Can you smell burning?

2016 was the 350th anniversary of the Great Fire of London, and to mark this the Museum of London held a special exhibition which we visited in November. There was a fascinating amount of material about the fire, backed up with social history of the era, and something for everyone from young child to serious adult enquirer - I expect real academics would already know everything that was here! It covered the fire itself, the tackling of it, and the way that London set about recovering: not just rebuilding but dealing with those who had lost their possessions, in an age when insurance was not available for most.

We were looking for an occasion to go to London because we had a gift voucher for afternoon tea at The Wolseley in Piccadilly and London is a long way to go just for tea, no matter how grand the tea! This fitted the bill nicely: morning at the Museum, afternoon tea, and it was also late enough in the year to see the Christmas lights in the West End, and then a quick visit to family before getting the usual train home.

Getting to the Museum of London is a cinch for us. The entrance to the museum is off a traffic island (yes, really, but there is a bridge to it!) at the southern end of the A1 Great North Road, on which we live, 90 miles further north; much quicker and far more comfortable, though, it is just along the street from Barbican Underground station, just two stops from Kings Cross where our Virgin Trains East Coast services drop us after a very fast ride from Peterborough.

(The exhibition is still on now for the last few days over the Easter holiday, too!)

 The great fire began in the middle of the night, so it spread quickly before anyone was awake to tackle it.

The exhibition contained many images (all paintings and drawings, of course!) of the fire alongside contemporary descriptions and current notes and interpretations to help understanding.

Many churches were destroyed, including St Paul's Cathedral (seen here) and the beautiful work of Sir Christopher Wren and Robert Hooke whose designs replaced them is an indirect benefit of the Great Fire!

I love the idea that the 22 judges who sorted out the disputes over who paid for what repairs gave their time free of charge and worked on a rota of three at a time, and that they were given their portraits as a thank-you present for all their work!

Three of the portraits were on display.

As always we travelled up to London by Virgin Trains East Coast, with Advance First Class tickets making this a special day for minimal extra outlay - always worth travelling First Class if you can commit to a specific time a few weeks in advance, especially midweek (as this was - since my wife's retirement we can travel on my midweek day off) when the refreshments on the train are excellent and include wine, spirits etc on the way home.

Can't get enough of London

I am just back from a morning at the Museum of London Docklands, which we visited for the "Tunnel" temporary exhibition about the archeology uncovered by the construction work for the Elizabeth Line, the Crossrail Project. Returning it occurred to me that I have not yet written about our visit last year to the exhibition marking the 350th anniversary of the 1666 Great Fire of London. As I write this I have just been amazed to be told by Trip Advisor that I am in the top 1% of reviewers of London - a sign, I suppose, that I visit so often! Both of these museum visits were hung onto visiting of family in London, as I wrote about a little while ago in my post, "The Usual Train," and we did return on the usual train, the 19:30 to Bradford, in our usual seats 31 & 33 in coach L.

Looking west towards the museum
from West India Quay DLR station

In order to fit in our time at the Museum of London Docklands before our luncheon engagement in Hammersmith, we left Stamford on the 08:00 train for Peterborough and after a brief wait there caught the 08:33 Virgin Trains East Coast service to London. It arrived just on time at Kings Cross, a journey of just under 90 minutes station-to-station from Stamford. The Northern Line Tube to Bank was an easy journey, using our Oyster cards, then Docklands Light Railway to the best station for the museum, West India Quay. A slight problem was that since the extensive remodelling of the junction there, trains from the City cannot stop at that station, so we had to go on to Canary Wharf (all of about 100 metres, but over water!) and get the next train back - frustrating if in a hurry, I suppose, but it "wasted" only about 4 minutes and we were on a leisure trip which did not really matter. It is not much more of a walk from Canery Wharf, actually, but not being local I was unsure of the way - I know it now and might do that on my next trip, and there will be another trip, for all we had time to do on this one was the Tunnel exhibition, and there is all the permanent display still to see!


It was a gorgeous, sunny day and a pleasant waterside stroll to the museum, which was just opening its doors as we arrived at 10:00, the first visitors of the day and just two hours after boarding our train in Stamford. We were greeted, introduced to the exhibits and let in. Admission is free of charge and donations are invited, there is a coffee shop, cafeteria and a children's soft play area on a dockland theme: given that admission is free, these are a fantastic resource for local families.

The Tunnel exhibition is on until September and is worth a visit if you have any interest at all in either the history of London or the construction of this huge transport project. The tunnels themselves, like all deep level tubes, are well below the level of archeological remains, but the portals and the stations and other access points were dug through many layers of London's history and revealed some very interesting facts - although the explanations are often shrouded in mystery!

There are lockers at just £1 for luggage, coats etc: we did not have coats but we did have bags of Easter and Birthday presents en route for Hammersmith and it was well worth £1 not to have to traipse them round the exhibition. Coffee and then DLR train to Bank, through the corridor to Monument station for the District Line to Hammersmith and our visit was completed with a family lunch and a stroll be the Thames before the usual train home ...

... and I still have write about the Great Fire. Give me a day or two ...

Adventures need not take long!

The first few adventurers wait at Stamford station

As I reported recently, I have finally arranged a party in a brewery, that legendary event that is supposed to be as easy to organise as, well, a party in a brewery. It becomes difficult when you have to get the date and time to suit the brewery in questions (the Grainstore in Oakham in this case) and potential guests, and when I want/need to be available myself to go along and "make sure everything is OK".

There it goes - our train leaves us at Oakham

Every journey, they say, starts with a single step, but where to start? What step? I had ascertained that Tuesday evenings seemed to be best, so I consulted my own diary and rang the brewery. I made a provisional booking for their top package: a tour plus samples, followed by supper with unlimited (within two hours) ale. The train timetable decided the time: we'd need to get the last train home at 21:46 from Oakham, so we needed to get there on the 18:05 to ensure that we had sufficient time for all the activities - although that left only about 90 minutes for the unlimited ale, probably not a bad thing if we were to be allowed on the train home!

It worked well. A group of mixed ages, mostly men but with some women, set off from Stamford on a lovely February evening and had a very informative tour of this microbrewery, totally different from the huge Banks's Brewery I had visited in Wolverhampton a few years before. Usually the supper is a ploughman's supper and this was indeed on offer, but it happened that on Tuesday nights they have a build-a-burger evening at the brewery tap so we were allowed an alternative of a modest two-topping burger instead if we preferred, which some of us did.

Proof that I can indeed organise a party in a
brewery!

I can recommend a visit to the Grainstore, whether to do their tour or simply to drink and eat, and it is next to the railway station, so there is no problem getting home, so long as you either live near your local station or have a lift home from the station!

Cross Country Trains did a great job of getting us there on time (so not wasting part of our evening) and getting us home on time, too. All in all, a great evening.












If you live near Stamford, Oakham or Peterborough and are interested in joining me on some of these day trips, please see the "Come with me!" Page.