yes today was the day to drive from Redworth Hall to Stirling and our mate Sue's, and as we were staying just round the corner from Locomotion, the National Railway Museum's 2nd site at Shildon we just had to pop in for a visit. Jane was thrilled of course and managed to find a nice cafe in the main exhibition hall to quietly sit and people watch. I had wanted to visit this site on the last few visits to the UK, but it was just too far for a day trip out of Bed...

Didn't we have a lovely day in Scarborough. This is where Yorkshire has traditionally come on holiday, and you can see why with the great expanse of sandy beaches in both the bays. Scarborough came into its own during the late 19th Century when train travel took off, and a lot of the buildings as you can see from the photos are from that era. Jane had always wanted to see Scarborough so we decided to have a driving day between York and this evenings hotel near ...

An early start to the day so we could get to Pickering to catch the first train on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway, this is one of the longest steam hauled tourist trains in the UK We boarded the train around 15mins before the train was due to leave and struggled to find a couple of seats together, it was packed. Maybe it was Jane wearing one of the caps which kept people away from sitting beside her as by the time the train pulled out of Pickering station she...

Following a good nights sleep, no doubt aided by the swift half or two, (not Old Speckled Hen), it was time for a hearty breakfast and then off to the National Railway Museum, well one of us anyway. The NRM is arguably the best museum of its type anywhere in the world, with over 1 million items of railway memorabilia spanning 300yrs and 60 locomotives to see it was well worth the visit. highlights were seeing the replica of the Rocket, the real Mallard and Eveni...

Picked up the hire car this morning, and other than a hiccup with the hire company's computer system which gave us an hours delay in leaving London all went well. We drove up from London to York, via Bedford where we had lunch with relations. Other than a couple of delays on the A1 (someone forgot to check what else was going on) due to the Burghley Horse trials we were in York and checked in to the hotel by 7pm. Sure enough the caps continue to travel with us,...