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 Bedford.

Whilst not as extensive as the NRM in York it has some really good items on display. Of note were Cornwall one of the first locomotives ever preserved on retirement from service, Sir Winston Churchill which was the locomotive which fittingly carried Sir Winston to his burial, and the prototype Deltic.

One of the main items on display was the experimental APT, which was the forerunner of the Pendilino trains currently running throughout various parts of Europe. The APT developed a tilting mechanism to allow the train to run at higher speeds through the curves of the railway. In the end the UK sold this technology overseas as they could not agree on how to operate it, the unions in particular telling their members they were not allowed to drive it as it only had a single drivers position in the cab, as opposed to 2 positions in all other engines.

We then drove through the A roads across the N. Penines and Cumbria to Scotland which made for some spectacular scenery, which we have in our memories, but unfortunately not in pictures. Arriving n Scotland we were made to feel really welcome as the rain started and the temperature dropped by 5 degrees as we crossed the border, luckily by the time we made it to Stirling the rain had cleared up and the sun was back out.