Saturday 13th was the date chosen by Jane (from Is That You Darling) for September's photo an hour challenge. It also marked one year since I first took part in her challenge!
It was a day we'd been planning for months; Andrew's dad turns 74 today so we'd organised Saturday as a mystery tour for him to a place he'd been meaning to visit for about 40 years.
8am - We were up early to take organise our stuff and pack a flask and cake. Everything was planned out, all we had to do was pick them up around 8.30am.
9am - On the road with the in laws and the weather's not quite as good as we'd hoped for!
10am - Brightening up a bit now but we were still only about halfway to our destination.
11am - Onto the motorway for the last bit of the journey and luckily the M4 wasn't too busy.
12pm - Finally we arrived at our mystery place, Didcot to visit the railway centre museum.
1pm - Our first ride of the day was on a 1940 diesel GWR railcar.
2pm - We made sure to explore the whole site including the locomotive workshop where one engine in restoration is this one, 4079 GWR Pendennis Castle.
3pm - Then it was on to the museum and archives bit where there's a striking picture of the map of what the rail network used to look like in South West England.
4pm - Last visit of the day was the air raid shelter where you can experience what it was like to be in one while the bombs were dropping.
5pm - Back on the road again, this time doing the short hop along the motorway to Swindon to find some dinner.
6pm - Ed's Easy Diner was the other part of the mystery tour, all of us like the wallboxes and music so we put on a few songs while we were waiting for the food to be served.
7pm - I had a chicken BLT and sweet potato fries for dinner and had this gooey chocolate brownie for pudding!
8pm - On the way home now and we drove through Bradford on Avon where there appeared to be some kind of street party going on (we later found out it was the 'End of Summer Party' at the town's Arts Festival)
9pm - Back home and unpacking our flasks and cake from earlier in the day.
10pm - Then just to carry on our rock and roll lifestyle, we settled down to watch the end of Last Night of the Proms!
11pm - And finally a cuppa and book before bedtime.
Pop over to Jane's blog to see when the October photo an hour challenge will be!
Also, check out what I was up to in...
Great post! The museum looks really good and that diner is so cool and retro. :)
ReplyDeletetheemeralddove21.blogspot.co.uk
I'm so glad the weather cheered up for your adventures. Being in a bomb shelter sounds terrifying- I'd probably get too caught up in the moment and end up screaming! xxx
ReplyDeleteGlad you had a good day.It was nice that so many of us photo an hour peeps were out and about that day.x
ReplyDeleteOh what a lovely day!x
ReplyDeleteI loved how many of us were out for Photo an Hour this month! Looking forward to the next one already :)
ReplyDeleteJane