Hello one and all,

Well another fun weekend of camping and visits to some brilliant places, namely the wonderful Black country living Museum in Dudley in the West Midlands. The Museum boasts an electric trolley bus, trams, canal boats, a vintage fun fair and a small village setup with a wonderful gentleman's  outfitters, where yours truly bought a wonderful night shirt (which was brilliant to wear for bed that evening)




(Above - Bringing the picnic to the Tram shed. A great view of the  vintage helterskelter )

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(A white knuckle ride)



We spent a whole day entertaining ourselves, by chatting to the staff (who were all pleased to see us) some of us attended school and naughty boy Carl was made an example of and given the cane by the teacher :)



On the Sunday we did our annual pilgrimage to Claymills pumping station, which again was fantastic. The station was in full steam,



We were given the main floor of engine house A & B (these engines are currently undergoing restoration) for our picnic - a rare honour especially as Queen Victoria again agreed to officially open it by cutting the ceremonial cake



The Palace of curiosities exhibited the Marcus Island mermaid, which attracted the attention of the "Save the Marcus Island Mermaids" protest group (all good fun and for once making David Oxley lost for words)





After a hard day of exhibiting/Scamming the public with the Palace, Mr Von Cudworth decided to try the steam heated bath



We are all looking forward to going again next year as it is really nice to see so many smiling faces and people who are really passionate about steam.

Check out their websites :-

www.bclm.co.uk   -  Black Country Living Museum
www.claymills.org.uk - Claymills


So until next time