Nice places to stop off at.....

[NewcastleFalcon]

Country parks, and well done to the organisations who look after them,.

Mentioned these in connection with Bolam Lake before very picturesque.

Completely different one this but equally as fascinating for a decent root around for the brick enthusiast. Lots of stuff to discover off piste from the pathways!

Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

An absolute and unexpected Fest

Tanfield/South Causey Inn Antiques (Raine&James)

A table full of named bricks Must have been more than 100, Including this from Consett which I took to the till only to find they wanted £10 each!	must have been about 100 or more	One to find rather than stump up £10 for!
An Ironcrete Lawn Roller		Ironcrete
Tax Disc Artwork and a "Bristol" Compressor	Tax disc Art
Gorgeous colourful tulips in Tanfield Village next to Bayberry Hollow Scone, Brownie and Coffee emporium!

Neil

[CitroJim]

£10 for a brick... They must be very collectable now!

[NewcastleFalcon]

£10 for a brick... They must be very collectable now!

They aren't making them any more! (well they are of course but the individuality and proliferation of all the brickworks around the country of the late 19th and early 20th century and their trademarks names and stamps have gone.). The bricks of that period being of such robust construction survive, some of them are so hard and well fired you are hard pushed to drill into them with modern power tools and bits.

If I wasn't such a skinflint, and had less faith, motivation and persistence to go out and search for them I would have happily paid a tenner for that Consett brick, for its personal connection, and added it to my garden/signal box wall.
Round the country there are literally tens of thousands of differently named bricks from that period. Amongst them connection with a name or a place for virtually anyone in the Country is likely, maybe enough for the less skinflinty to fork out a tenner for one.

Neil

[bobins]

Inside Anne - own work

By request of The Guv'nor

Me and Mrs Bobins spent a good few hours today at the Hovercraft Museum down at Lee-On-The-Solent between Pompey and Southampton https://www.hovercraft-museum.org/
They have a very large collection of hovercraft and it's more interesting than you might first think
Plenty on the history and evolution of the craft, lots of old adverts and promo films from 'back in the day', quite a few hovercraft to climb in and over - though one of them was knee-deep in eels for some reason
The picture at the top is of SRN-4 Princess Anne - she's surprisingly large inside but is looking a little 'tired' these days and it's a long time since she's done any work
The cafe on site is basic (tea, coffee, cakes, etc) and the whole place is run on a shoestring by volunteers, but is well worth visiting if you're in the area with nothing better to do If you're a cheapskate like me then parking can be found on the surrounding roads for free rather than paying for the seafront car parks

I'm sure I've been on the Pompey - Isle of Wight hovercraft passenger service before way back in olden times, but can't remember when

[NewcastleFalcon]

Some nice places to stop off at you don't even have to get out of your armchair, but if its reasonably close-by always better to see things IRL In Real Life even if you get a better view on the Telly

The Peregrines at English Cathedrals.

Worcester


Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

Some nice places to stop off at you don't even have to get out of your armchair, but if its reasonably close-by always better to see things IRL In Real Life even if you get a better view on the Telly

The Peregrines at English Cathedrals.

and a matter of days later an IRL Peregrine is spotted by the Falcon.

Peregrine Falcon in the sky above Brampton

Neil

[mickthemaverick]

Or maybe not:

[NewcastleFalcon]

First time I have heard about it, will have driven the road skirting it on more than one occasion without realising it was there, or indeed of its potential danger.

Neil

[mickthemaverick]

Certainly strikes me as dangerous, if you were taking a casual walk across the land and came across it, I'm sure you would just treat it as a little stream and may well elect to have a foot cooling paddle, ooops!!!

[bobins]

Looks like the British Motor museum at Gaydon is a nice place to stop off at. I have only been there on a virtual visit via a you tube vid.......
Neil

A gentle nudge from The Guv'nor

I visited The British Motor Museum at Gaydon the other day. https://www.britishmotormuseum.co.uk/ Well worth a visit if you've never been. Plenty of scope for : "I remember those. I used to have one of those. They were awful cars" Etc, Etc. Loads of cars on show with loads of info, very helpful staff, a decent cafe / restaurant, loads of parking, very easy access from the M40, quite a few 'specials'* days where there's something extra going on, and an option to tick various boxes if you book your ticket online and that gives you free access for virtually a whole year. My only very slight criticism is that it was quite (very !) warm in there for me and so I was flagging a bit by the halfway mark, but there's a lot of seating around the place to stop and take 5 minutes.
It gets the Bobins Seal of Approval

*- The McLaren Owners Club (or somesuch) had a gathering there on the day we visited. I took great pleasure in ignoring their cars

[NewcastleFalcon]

Your local farm ice cream parlour.

Like Morwick Dairy near Warkworth, and not far from today's pub of the day... viewtopic.php?p=800198#p800198

Today was an ice cream day...but the bonus at the Morwick, a couple had chosen to bring their Saab 96 in caramel flavour to the parlour.

Ayrshire Calves

SAAB at the parlour

Neil

[bobins]

Two things......

This isn't really 'a nice place to stop off at' unless you happen to be in the area.
This definitely won't appeal to everyone.... or probably anyone

Up relatively high in the ironworks - own work

Saarbrucken isn't really on many people's holiday destination list.... but if you like a bit of overwhelming industrialness.... or have an appreciation of Tarkovsky's films then you'll definitely like the Völklingen Ironworks https://voelklinger-huette.org/en/ It's basically a complete ironworks - blast furncaecs, coking plant, and all the other associated 'stuff' that goes with it - all preserved and available to explore from top to bottom. It's a UNESCO World Heritage site and has been for about 30 years. You pay your Euros and follow the trail as best you can. Up ladders, around buildings, under, over, through. The 'viewing platform' is atop one of the blast furnaces - somewhere about 150' (*) above the ground. Bit of a 'ring twitcher'

Some pipes and stuff - own work

Fume cleansing plant - own work

Just over the way from the Völklingen Ironworks is a current steelworks and you can stand there feeling the heat from the 'torpedo' wagons that contain the molten steely stuff. If you zoom in you might see the glow out of the hatch from the molten 'stuff'.

Hot molten stuff in a torpedo - own work

We spent 4 hours exploring the site and I think they might be looking to expand it a little. It gets the "Bobins Seal of Approval" Well worth it.

*- the following day we went in the opposite direction and ventured about 2400' unerground

[CitroJim]

Awesome! Would love to visit that...

Saarbrucken was also the location of large AM radio broadcast transmitter. The name appears on many vintage radio dials...

[bobins]

You can have a virtual wander around the LW (Europe 1) transmitter hall via Google if you want

https://artsandculture.google.com/stree ... w6Uz3L41cQ