Spent most of the day driving across and down England… just over 300 miles of it. And was amazed to find I could park right outside my home having left it on Friday morning! (It's in a street of terraces built when cars were still for the nobs and celebs of the day.)
Why (the drive, not celebs)?
Saturday at Bressingham Steam Museum – so far away I made a long weekend of it, camping a few miles away. The event in particular was a miniature road steam vehicle gathering; not really a "rally" in the usual sense but the mid-afternoon ring parade, with commentator, drew a satisfyingly large public audience. I asked one owner of numbers in steam and he thought about 35. The engines had number-cards but if there was any published list I did not see it.
Otherwise the engines were driving around the Museum site quite informally, as were a couple of full-size ones though their room to explore was obviously much more limited.
The admission ticket included rides on the impressive 2ft and 15-inch gauge railways, and I took both. It also included rides on the 100+ years old Savages gallopers, but I didn't take that offer.
I was surprised to find – and follow round – a ground-level 7.25 and 5" gauge railway looking a little forlorn among the weeds. Enquiring I was told it had not been used for a while.
Took lots of pics – will load some here when I've sorted them. Too knackered now after that drive home. Yet I have driven practically the same distance there and back in one day, twice – or is three times now, Michelle? – responding to sales ads on this very Forum; the seller living in Norfolk!
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That were Saturday.
'
Sunday – a pleasant few hours exploring Thetford. Need I say why?
The Charles Burrell Museum is housed in what had been the paint-shop, and its huge double-doors opening straight onto the street (Minstergate) need a lick of paint themselves, but I suppose it's like any other similar collection – someone has to do it.
I had expected it might be closed on Sunday but a smaller door opened and a dog emerged, leading a lad who said "yes" when I asked if it was open.
Stepped inside. The little ticket-office was in darkness. "Maybe a bit early yet", I thought and followed my ears towards voices. After admiring some miniature engines in front of a full-size Burrell general-purpose engine, I came up behind a sizeable party being told all about Dad's Army, by a gentleman in WW2 khaki with an incongruous high-vis vest; and standing in front of Cpl Jones' butcher's van.
Eh? – I discovered that Walmington-on-Sea is really Thetford-(-Not-Near-the-Sea).
Five minutes later I was politely ushered out along with Sgt. Flourescent and his audience; by the Museum curator locking up. The Museum is open only on Saturdays and Tuesdays (difficult to find volunteers) and I'd stumbled into a town tour of the show's locations. (Some scenes, including the title sequence with the whizz-bangs, were filmed on an Army training-range elsewhere in Norfolk, and the occasional sea scenes borrowed Lowestoft or Great Yarmouth.)
The rest of the day involved a fens walk, trying to spot where the Rivers Little Ouse and Waveney, flow away from each other from points so close that they almost make Norfolk a North Sea island. Fruitless though, as I found the paths don't go near that close point.
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A Plug if such be allowed here:
Courtesy of the Parish Magazine in the pub in Hopton (excellent selection of cask ales and ciders, too!)
August 27th.
Charity Road Run – by 6 miniature traction-engines.
Five-mile circuit based on Theltenham Windmill. Though apparently not on one of the preserved mill's advertised Summer-monthly open days, unless it will be for the occasion.
Donate via Justgiving (one word) .com and search by "steam engine fundraiser for cancer" [research] to reveal it is being organised by Mark Goddard in memory of his sister. The page uses a photograph of, I assume him, driving a 4" (or larger?) scale Burrell TE outside what I recognised as its ancestral home.
I should add I do not know Mr. Goddard, I live some three hundred miles from Thetford and Theltenham; and I found the advertisement by sheer chance, in the Parish News of the United Benefice of Hopton [& several other villages].