Today we were supposed to be going on a visit to the RAF museum in Hendon, which is part of Greater London, with the Cubs and Scouts but it seemed as if our plans would be scuppered before we even left the house when the car failed to start, but made up for this by making a most peculiar noise when it tried. Once more, it seemed, the unreliable electrical system had chosen to mess with us at the most inconvenient of times!
As luck would have it, good for a change,
1. Deb had her phone with her (Unflipping Believable)
2. It was charged (will miracles never cease) and, finally, what is more
3. She had, an up to date, contact number for one of the trip organizers.
Well, by the time I’d regained consciousness, she’d called said contact, explained our situation and arranged for the coach to stop nearby and pick us up as it headed for the motorway.
So, after a brief wait, we were on our way to “The Smoke” or at least to its outskirts. Nat sat with me and Han sat with Deb. Determined to ensure that conversation continued to be a dying art Nat immediately plugged his head phones in to my old Nokia N95 and started listening to episode two of Hardcore History’s Punic Nightmare. Following suit, I too, plugged in my phones and settled back to enjoy a little podcast pleasure.
We had, it seemed, a rather talkative driver on this trip who regaled us with snippets of information about the various places we were passing on our journey; for some reason Deb found this quite odd and remarked the next day that she imagined he would be an extremely boring person to talk to. I, on the other hand, thought he was quite interesting and kept removing my headphones to hear what he had to say. This was why I eventually stopped listening to podcasts and switched to music instead. Oh the joy of rediscovering just how good 10CC were (a 1970’s band I loved as a teenager and who, having reformed, are performing in Birmingham next week). Eventually reaching our destination (http://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/london/) we disembarked and were briefed on what we would be doing that day. Each Cub and each Scout was given a questionnaire that they were required complete in order to win their (RAF Museum Visit!!!???) badge. They would only be able to do so if they toured the whole museum and searched carefully for the answers that were hidden there.
It most certainly was an impressive place, I’ve no idea exactly how many planes were on display (I didn’t have to earn a RAFMV badge did I but here’s a link to the list the museum website gives http://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/london/collections/aircraft/london-aircraft-collection.cfm) but I can certainly confirm there were a bloody great lot of them. You can’t really appreciate the size of these old flyers when you see them on film, it’s only when you’re standing next to a, for example, WW2 USAF Mustang, that you grasp just how big the dang thing is! The visible part of the engine is bigger than our whole car and it’s easy to see why inadvertently walking into a spinning turboprop would totally ruin your day! Even the old biplanes, which for some reason I’d always imagined as being tiny, were much, much larger than expected. I think it may be because we equate fragility with daintiness and we’ve all grown up with an image in our minds of these early fighters as fragile creations of wood paper and wire that fell apart under the slightest stress. Believe me, there’s nothing dainty about these mothers! Below are is a large selection of photos which I think prove my point. (INSERT PHOTOS).
After we’d toured the first hall and Han and Nat had ridden in one of the simulators we crossed over to another building which was dedicated to the history of British Aviation during WW2 and particularly to the story of The Battle of Britain.
One of the most impressive exhibits was a full size flying boat that one could actually enter and walk through from front to back. We’d thought that now we’d seen everything but subsequently looking at the museum website I think we may have missed a few exhibits although I’m not quite sure how we managed to do that.
We returned via the shop where we bought a few souvenirs including two of the legendry Biggles books which are once more back in print. The collected boxed set was priced, outrageously, at £39.99 and that was with £10 off!
We decided to take another look at the battle of Britain exhibition but in the end we ended up in the restaurant where we paid £13 for a few drinks and a couple of cakes! Appropriately, I had a bottle of Shepherd Neame brewery Spitfire Ale and very nice it was. Finally it was 4 O’clock and we headed back to the coach for the return journey.
The kind driver once more dropped as near home and our day out was over.
Deb contacted the RAC Re: the car but after they advised that they were exceptionally busy agreed that there was no urgent need for the car that night and we’d be able to wait until the following morning. Because Nat had to play in a rugby match the next morning Deb phoned Jacob’s Dad Bruce who agreed that he would pick Nat up and also take him, along with Jacob and Zak and Zak’s Dad Chris, to the match.
There’s nothing more really to say about the day but as I’ve not yet reached a thousand words I’m going to have to procrastinate a little here just to reach that magical but also, paradoxically, totally arbitrary, figure. Now, normally, at this point I’d just make up some total bull to fill up the space but I’m beginning to feel that this is something of a cheat so instead I’ll use the time to instead tell you this. What a literary device that proved to be, taking up space by writing about why I didn’t just want to just take up space with pointless waffle. Same end achieved but I come out looking (seemingly) noble instead of venal.
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