Day Out To Black Country Living Museum

We had planned to visit London Zoo on Wednesday, taking advantage of the fact that Carol was a Fellow of the Zoological Society of London and get free entry for both of us, as we also do for Whipsnade Zoo. But on researching train tickets it seems far too expensive. How on earth can train tickets cost so much? This would be enough to put off many people from visiting London. And we couldn't leave early to take advantage of any so-called 'special offers.'  We then  did some research on-line and decided on a visit to The Black Country Living Museum at Dudley, near Birmingham. We have seen glimpses of this open air museum on television programmes and it sounded the sort of place we'd enjoy. We've been to Beamish Museum in the north east of England which would seem to be very similar, so that is where we went on Wednesday.

On arrival at the carpark we found many people also turning up, some including coaches. Within the main entrance building there was a long queue in the booking hall and in all we had to queue for around 30 minutes. We decided it would be better value to turn our entrance tickets into yearly membership which means we can return as many times as we like over the next twelve months without having to pay entrance fees or car parking (an additional £3. This is fair enough, but I do think if you're paying for entrance and you arrive by car you shouldn't have to pay this. As a charity I can understand they have to raise cash somehow, but this does seem a bit unfair.) You got a metal token which you use to raise the barrier when you drive out of the carpark.

Once within the museum site we discovered that it was a fair walk down into the main part of the museum site. Several vintage vehicles, including a red bus, a trolley bus and tram, could be used to convey you to the main town further down the hill. We decided to walk. Probably not such a good idea as it was quite tiring. Rough cinder on the paths really hurt our feet. Never mind.

There are many reconstructed buildings on the site of The Black Country Living Museum. Carefully demolished in their original location and then transported to the site and then reconstructed and fitted out with furniture and everything inside to fit the correct time frame in which they were originally built, giving a sort of snapshot of their historic context. They are all from the area around Dudley, which is known as The Black Country. Due to the soot and smoke produced by the industries in the area.

The first building we visited was a cast iron house. Quite amazing to think that at one time they constructed houses from cast iron. What about rusting? Did they stay warm in winter and cool in summer? If you lived in one could you hang wallpaper? Were they safe if you had electricity? I'm thinking about earthing the power supply. It does make me wonder. We walked on down towards the town area, past a mine. You could go inside but there was a long queue which put us off. I'm not to keen on being in an enclosed space such as a mine or a cave so it wasn't something I'd want to experience and certainly not if it was a small space and you had to go down and underground. We walked on and got to the period fairground. There's a heater skelter as well as a wide range of stalls. You have to pay to go on any of the rides or exhibits. We bought burgers from a stall around here and sat  on benches near the canal and ate them. We had intended buying fish and chips from the shop which was part of the period shops, but when we saw the queue of people outside we decided against the idea. This queue was moving extremely slow and it seemed to take perhaps 20 minutes to reach the shop. A pity, because from what we saw of the actual fish and chips that people were carrying away it looked very appetising and the portions looked large. There is a period garage along with some period vehicles in the area near the fairground. We didn't visit.

We went inside the school. Period lessons were held at regular intervals during the day, but we weren't there at the time it said on the sign inside the building. Pity, because, as Carol is a teacher herself she would have been interested to see how the style of teaching had changed over the years. We went into several of the houses to view the interiors and in some we were surprised at the size of the rooms. Very small and cramped. If they had several children it makes you wonder how they coped.

We watched as someone demonstrated making nails and another man showed how chain was forged. There was a cinema, which apparently had been built in a private back garden in a house somewhere around the Dudley area. We sat and watched a silent Laurel and Hardy film. I was surprised how some people laughed whilst others didn't respond at all. (How do modern day children respond to the antics of these two? I've always enjoyed their films and have only recently bought a 20 DVD collection of all their short films. £35 on Amazon, but it was £200 when the set first came out. We saw if for around £50 a few years ago in H.H.V. in Milton Keynes, so at that price it was good value.)

 View across canal bridge

 Period trolley bus

Interior of tobacconist's shop

Out in the street children were playing with hoops. Rolling them along the cobbles with sticks. Great to see modern children doing something that is 'real' and not computer-related. So many people walk around with their mobile phones stuck to their ears or peering at the screens and seem so disconnected with the 'real' world. It makes you wonder how they would cope if these gadgets were taken off them. They don't seem to be engaged with what's going on around them. It's the same when we've visited either Whipsnade Zoo or Twycross Zoo. People are so busy taking 'selfies' of themselves, slap-bang in front of some of the animal enclosures. They seem more interested in themselves than in looking at the animals. Similar at this museum.

Wandered in and out of more of the buildings, including an ironmonger's, tobacconist, baker's and several more and then a church.

So we went back to the bus stop. We had to wait a good twenty minutes, but it was actually quite nice to sit down and relax for a while. We eventually caught the bus and arrived back at the top of the hill where we'd entered the museum. We had a look at some vintage vehicles in a garage and then went inside the visitor's centre, had a cup of tea and a pastry and bought a guidebook and by then we'd decided we'd seen all we wanted to see and returned to our car to drive home.

We did follow the SatNav's direction. It is generally very good, but for some reason it took us into central Birmingham instead of navigating us back home the way we'd come, which was odd. So it took a good 30 minutes longer than it should have done. Don't always follow the SatNav we've learned. All together it was a very enjoyable day out and we'll be returning sometime again in the Spring now we have a year's membership of this particular museum.

Twycross Trip and Visit to Urgent Care Centre

Last year we visited Twycross Zoo for the first time. Well, it was for me. As Carol lived in Leicestershire, in a village called Thornton, which is very close, she says she remembers visiting when she was at school. A one-and-a-half hour journey up the A5 and we found it fairly easily. I think it's quicker than going north on the M1, which, as far as I know, still has roadworks which means you have to drive at 50 m.p.h., which is somewhat annoying. These roadworks have been going on for far too long and what is more than annoying is the fact that they close off mile upon mile or motorway lanes and there never appears to be any work going on. I think something seriously needs to be done about this as it must be causing inconvenience to many people and must be frustrating to local businesses.

The day started out relatively cold, although bright. It was therefore quite difficult to decide what to wear and I wore my hooded fleece. As the day progressed the weather got warmer which meant I didn't really need the fleece and spent most of the day carrying it around with me.

We got to Twycross at 10.30 and immediately noticed that the carpark had been re-surfaced. Infact the whole place  seems to have had a make-over, with not only roads and paths having new surfaces but a complete re-design of the logo and better signage through the zoo. We immediately made for the newly-opened Gibbon Forest exhibit, which was being build when we visited almost exactly a year ago. At that time it was under wraps and it meant you have to navigate the zoo too avoid any of the building work. There is an island exhibit, which looks as if it is still being completed. But you go inside the building and up several levels and can see the gibbons in very naturalistic environments. We spent some time watching these amazing creatures climbing and swinging about on ropes and what look like tapes and moving very fast across the ceiling of the exhibit.

We had something to eat in one of the many cafes and restaurants throughout the zoo. By this time it was getting quite warm and the place was beginning to get quite crowded.

Over-all, our stay at the zoo was around three and a half hours. You can never get to see everything, which means we can visit again and manage to see the rest of the animals that are exhibited. We left and returned home. We had to do shopping so visited Sainsbury's.

We had our evening meal, and Carol was concerned about a rather nasty rash on her leg. It has become very uncomfortable and itchy. She has a cream, prescribed by her doctor, but it does not seem to be clearing. She says that it has begun to swell and it may have something to do with the fact that she has type 2 diabetes. She said she needed a doctor's appointment. I was beginning to get somewhat concerned. She could have waited until Monday to make an appointment, but, considering how the appointment system works at our surgery, Ashfield Medical Centre, it would be almost impossible to get an appointment. So we decided to go to the Urgent CareCentre at Milton Keynes Hospital, formerly called the 'Walk-In Centre.' This is where you go if you have a medical condition which isn't strictly urgent enough for you to need to go to Accident and Emergency. It is staffed by doctors and nurses who are able to diagnose specific medical problems and refer you to other medical practitioners if they are unable to help. We were reluctant to go there, but as this rash was getting worse it was clear that something needed to be done. We drove there, arriving at around 8.15. Carol was questioned by the receptionist, a form of triage and we sat and waited for her name to appear on the digital board so she could see a staff member. The place was already very busy when we arrived, and more people came in in the time we were there. In all we were there around three hours. She got prescription for antibiotics and we had to go to Boots at Kingston, near the big Tesco store, as there is a night pharmacy which could dispense the medication she needed. There were other people waiting, who we'd already seen in the Urgent Care Centre. You had to press a bell and a young man appeared and hand over your prescription form for him to make up the prescription. Carol has an exemption card which means she does not have to pay the prescription charge as she is diabetic. We had to go home as we didn't have my wallet which had the card in it. 

A Foggy Morning

It's what I would call a very typical autumn morning, cold, foggy with definite chill in the air. There were cobwebs picked out with early-morning dew on the bridge sides on the Redway across Saxon Street as Carol and I walked to the Academy this morning. I had considered taking the digital camera and photographing them as they are quite impressive but then wondered how I would achieve the best pictures when you would have to film with such a difficult background to make them stand out, so I haven't tried, although I may at some time in the future if I see them again.

Carol has a late night working at the Academy today. Something to do with parents coming in to talk about their children's education, but not sure exactly what.

It's hard to believe that it's almost blackberry-picking season again. There will be a good crop of blackberries where I usually go to pick them all along the Redway behind our house. As we have a much bigger fridge/freezer now, as a result of having to replace the old one which broke down a few months ago when we came back from our day out at Twycross Zoo, there should be more than enough space to put bags of blackberries to freeze. The landlord came to inspect the house a couple of weeks ago and didn't even notice that the fridge/freezer had been replaced. I should also mention that we had a surveyor come to check the house because the landlord is having the property re-mortgaged. We're still not sure what this is about, whether it's to have work done on the various maintenance bits-and-pieces that are needed, such as repairing the garden fence. But he assures us that 'there's nothing to worry about.' So we'll just have to trust him. But I still can't see why it has to take so long to sort out the fence.

I have had a letter from the Department of Work and Pensions about my State Pension. I'm surprised by how much it will be per week. It should certainly make our finances a bit more easy from the end of October (I get the first payment on 28 October which is a week after my birthday.) It means we will be able to afford a decent holiday next year at least. It's certainly a relief as I wasn't sure how much it was going to be. I set this up a few months ago 'on-line' and wasn't sure what was happening as I hadn't received any sort of acknowledgement, an email or letter, so when the letter arrived in the post yesterday it was something of a relief.

Calke Abbey and Car Break-Down

The sun was shining. Why spend a Saturday indoors when you could be outside, visiting a National Trust property? Visiting Whipsnade or even London Zoo or any of the attractions in and around Milton Keynes and the adjacent counties? We had looked in the National Trust handbook and on-line at their website and decided on Calke Abbey, which we had intended visiting a while ago and had given up on the journey up the M1 as it was in the middle of being widened or some other roadworks on it's length for I don't know how many miles going north from Milton Keynes and junction 14 on. We left home at around 9.30 a.m., having filled up with petrol at our usual Shell station in Grafton Street. We got on the motorway and the journey wasn't too bad but the confounded roadworks we eventually met meant we could only travel at 50 m.p.h. I don't know why they have to have these coned-off sections or why you have to drive so slowly and at one point along what would have been the hard shoulder. It really put a damper on the day's outing. We came off the motorway at junction 23 and headed for Calke Abbey and Ashby de la Zouche. Infact, it turned out to be not far from Twycross Zoo, which we visited a few months ago (see earlier blog post for details.) We arrived at Calke Abbey to discover the carpark overflowing. You drive in through a very attractive avenue of trees and through a park with sheep in it and at one point these sheep were laying down in the shade of the trees and one sheep in particular looked as if it might be dead rather than asleep and almost in the path of our car and others who followed into the carpark. We had to get a timed ticket in order to visit the house (it is to prevent too many people walking around at once.) Our time slot was at 1.45 which gave us time enough to have a drink and a sandwich in the very nice restaurant (there are actually two, as we discovered.) as well as browsing in the shop and then watching a video about Calke Abbey. I think it was actually a video of a television programme from a series that has been shown on the Sky Arts channel on National Trust properties and narrated by Martin Jarvis. I'd know his voice anywhere as he seems to make a living doing voice-overs and narrating books on B.B.C. Radio 4 Extra. We'd seen a couple of these documentaries and saw one on Waddesdon and another on Stourhead, two places we've visited at one time or other over the years. We wandered around the gardens, very beautifully kept, with attractive flower beds and all the rest and then wandered into the house. I'm not sure whether I liked it as much as some places we've visited, perhaps because it has been left in a  somewhat decayed and unkempt manner. Some of the rooms a a little too over furnished and in the Victorian style whereby there are too many ornaments for our taste. Some of the upstairs rooms are in a very poor state, but it's good that they are allowing the public to see how they go about restoring not only the structure of these old properties but also the artefacts within them, such as tapestries and pieces of furniture. A pity that so much of the house has to be left in almost complete darkness. I realise that they want to protect the interiors and furniture and other items from the damage which can be caused by light, but in some cases it's so dark you can barely see what's in some of the rooms.

We finished our tour of the house. We spent more time meandering around the grounds and then had a further rest to have ice-cream and a drink and then left for home. It took some while before we hit the correct road which lead to the M1. We again had to endure the confounded 50 m.p.h. zone through the roadworks. After a fairly short distance Carol, who was driving, said there was a problem with the car. An oil light came on on the dashboard and then a 'stop' sign lit up on the display. We've got used to the alarm which keeps coming on which shows there's a problem with the E.S.P. mechanism (described in greater detail in an earlier post, after we had visited another National Trust property at Ascott a few months ago.) What were we to do? Were we to continue with our journey, or find somewhere to draw into at the side of the motorway and wait for a recovery vehicle to come and rescue us as the signs kept on telling us on the boards all along the section of roadworks on the M1? There seemed no option but to pull over between the cones which sectioned off the lane which would in another situation been the hard shoulder which is intended for breakdowns. This is what we did and fortunately we have our own breakdown cover with Swinton insurance. I used my mobile to call for assistance which took a long time to connect. By the time I'd done this a breakdown truck had arrived and we had to be taken off the motorway at junction 16 and left in a truck-stop lay-by which fortunately had a pub where we could get a drink and a sandwich as well as very convenient toilets. We had to re-arrange the breakdown rescue from Swinton as they had been directed to collect us from the motorway. We we then informed that it would be a good two hours before they could arrive. But by then we were relieved to have been rescued from the motorway roadside as it was somewhat nerve -wracking, to say the least. Not something I would ever want to repeat, even though the traffic was moving at 50 m.p.h. through the roadworks it was still extremely heavy-flowing and dangerous. I have never, in all my driving career of some 45 years or so, broken down on a motorway and had to be rescued. Indeed, I think in all that time I have perhaps had no more than three callouts or had to use my car insurance for some incident. The rescue truck did eventually arrive and the car was lifted up onto the back of the truck and we were taken home. A very upsetting and annoying end to what had started out as such a pleasant day out and, considering what had happened to the car exactly a week ago in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne not something we had anticipated happening again. The driver who took us back to Milton Keynes had a look at the car when it had been delivered safely onto our driveway and said he thought it could be the head gasket that had caused the problem.

Day Out At Twycross Zoo

Carol said we were going to have an outing today and had said it was going to be a surprise but it turned out to be to Twycross Zoo.  We had originally decided that we'd go for a swim at D.W. Fitness and then decided against it as if we'd gone there at 8 o'clock we'd then be late getting out of Milton Keynes on our way to Twycross, which opened at 10. It was a reasonably good day weather-wise so it seemed a shame to not make the most of it and go out. We filled the car up with petrol where we usually go, the Shell station in Grafton Street and then drove out of Milton Keynes and on to the A5 near the stadium and went north through Towcester and not onto the M1 as we are still unsure that the Motorway isn't free of roadworks. The A5 is a far more pleasant drive as you see more scenery that you pass through and it seems a good deal less stressful than driving on the Motorway. Also, we have several places we like to visit, a couple of rather pleasant garden centres and shopping villages which have a certain quirkiness that we like and these places have cafes and coffee shops which make our visits all the more enjoyable. Also, they are good stopping places when you need what the Americans term a 'comfort break' or 'a bathroom break.' We also occasionally use the Aldi supermarket in Towcester for a change when we do our weekly supermarket shop. A good hour and twenty minutes or so after leaving Milton Keynes we arrived in the carpark at Twycross Zoo. found a parking space and walked in to the zoo after buying our entry tickets. I was surprised how compact it is, compared to, say, Whipsnade, which we have visited on several occasions and had membership for several years, which meant that, once paid, you can visit as many times as you wish throughout the year of your membership without having to pay the entry fee each time, in much the same way as membership of the National Trust allows free entry to their properties for a year. We only gave up the ZSL  (Zoological Society of London) membership when it became far too expensive (around £159 for a couple.) We managed to see so many animals that we have always wanted to see, such as gibbons and gorillas as well as urban utans, which we have seen in many television natural history programmes over the years, as well as giraffes and elephants.

 I just love elephants. I don't know what it is. The size of them as well as the fact that they can be so gentle, fascinating creatures.

 We enjoyed the antics of the penguins. Always so photogenic and seem to have a comical air about them. Perhaps it's the way they walk, but somehow they always amuse me for some reason I can't quite explain.

There's a great deal of building-work going on in Twycross Zoo at present. They are building new facilities, such as animal enclosures. It would appear that they are making these enclosures less like the old-fashioned idea of a 'zoo' where the animals were kept in cages with bars and not large enough to allow the animals to roam or fly around. The new elephant enclosure is more naturalistic and you walk through a sort of Asian inspired walk-way until you get to the elephants in a fenced-off area, giving more of a 'natural' environment which mimics as near as possible how they would lived in the wild. You can go into a butterfly 'walk-through' exhibit, kept at a high temperature, and the butterflies fly free inside and some come and settle on you! Quite amazing.

We had lunch in the fish bar, and it took around 20 minutes in a queue before we got served, but considering the number of people visiting today it's no wonder it was so busy, many of the visitors families with children. It is a very family-friendly place with plenty of things for small children to see and do. Perhaps the fact that it such a compact site is an advantage as you don't have to walk miles between exhibits as you would at other zoos, such as Whipsnade, where you seem to spend ages moving between the different animal enclosures. 

Apparently Twycross Zoo is the only place in the United Kingdom where you can see all four times of great ape. We saw Bornean orang utan, although only briefly as they soon disappeared into their houses when we appeared! Was it something we said? The other great apes there are West Lowland gorillas, and we saw a Silverback male, a really large creature, whom you would never want to meat on a dark night! We saw a family of bonobos, similar to chimpanzees, and it was great to see them playing, almost like a human family they way they interacted with each other. Also, chimpanzees, always seeming to be ready to have a game of some sort and some hiding away in their nests, so we didn't see them particularly well. Just one of the hazards of visiting any zoo I suppose. The weather can influence whether they come out to be seen. If it's cold, they hide away, and likewise, if it's too hot they stay in the shade. 

We also saw some huge Aldabran tortoises. Actually the first time I've seen them in real-life and not just in some natural history programme on television.

One of the best displays has to be the brand new Lorikeet Landing. These brightly-coloured little birds, similar to parakeets, are in an enclosure which you can go in and the birds are free-flying. You can purchase a bag of seeds and feed the birds. They dart about all over the place and some come and sit on you if you feed them the seeds. They are so brightly coloured they look as if they've come out of one of those children's television shows such as "The Midnight Garden," or "Teletubbies." We also went into the Lemur enclosure, very similar to what they have at Whipsnade, again, where you can see the lemurs up very close and personal, but on the occasion we were there we saw only one lemur! They didn't seem in the least bit keen to interact with us at all, but no doubt they were hiding somewhere in the long grass or some hiding place and watching us closely!

We spent a good four hours at Twycross Zoo. There were quite a few areas that we didn't have time to visit, so it seems we will have to make a further visit, perhaps later in the summer when (hopefully) all the building work has been completed. Fortunately they have managed to make the building work that is going on as inobtrusive as possible. We can't wait to see how the new enclosures look when they open and have their animals living in them. and when it was time to leave we visited the shop to have a browse and then drove home, back south down the A5. We stopped off in Towcester to visit Tesco's as we needed to get milk and a few other items and drove on home towards Milton Keynes.

As soon as we got home we discovered that the fridge/freezer wasn't working correctly. Infact the freezer section had stopped working all together and the contents were rapidly thawing out. Which might explain why the milk was off early this morning when I came to make tea as I usually do early. We have managed to order a new fridge/freezer from Very, the on-line and catalogue retailer from which we have purchased quite a number of items and it should be here on Monday. It means we will have to discard quite a lot of the food which is defrosting as it obviously can't be re-frozen. It's just as well we didn't buy more frozen food in Tesco as it would be wasted.