Just Jane at East Kirkby March 2012 & Pathfinders' 70th Anniversary Dinner

I know I don’t blog very often but I just had to blog about our fabulous day out on Saturday at East Kirkby, Lincolnshire http://www.lincsaviation.co.uk/about/ This wonderful Museum holds one of the rarest aircraft, an Avro Lancaster Bomber, known as Just Jane and what a beautiful old thing she is.

We attended the Special Access Photography Event in order to get up close to Just Jane. We took mum and dad with us. The weekend coincided with Mother's Day and Mum and Dad's 62nd Wedding Anniversary. Those of you who have read my previous blog “I’m so proud of my Dad”  http://bit.ly/FQa3fQ will understand why we took dad with us. He was Mid-Upper Gunner in the Pathfinder Force of Bomber Command in a Lancaster and completed 2 tours and went on 47 missions and I'm so very proud of him.

I cannot thank the Museum enough for organising such a fantastic day which ran like clockwork. The re-enactors who acted out various scenarios of “bombing up” were incredible.

I don't think we were supposed to take pics of the bombs being carried  and it certainly wouldn't have been that easy in wartime! 

The re-enactors really gave you a taster of what it was like in the 40’s and when they donned their flying gear, complete with gas mask and parachute I had visions of my dad at the tender age of 19 going off on a bombing mission when nightfall came. It was extremely emotional.

The crew bus which brought the Lancaster Crew to their plane

Indeed, as nightfall descended the Lancaster fired up her magnificent 4 Merlin engines. It was a tear-jerking moment to see and hear the unmistakable sound of the Lancaster.

When she taxied towards us  it was truly incredible. I thought my heart would burst with pride.

I was so moved and couldn't stem the tears that coursed down my face and I knew at that moment I had to hug my dad. I could see he had tears in his eyes too as did mum who said dad was gripping her hand so tight, she thought it would break. Just Jane then stopped at the end of the runway and revved up her engines and that is an experience I will never forget and neither will the hundred or so of us that experienced it!

When her engines were turned off after a few minutes, there was a silence like no other, which is when we all burst into a spontaneous round of applause.

I must say that if it hadn't have been for the wonderful world of Twitter I would never have met Sean Taylor (@Lancasterman) and Andrew Panton (@NX611_Pilot). If you read the history of East Kirkby Museum you'll see the Panton family connection http://www.lincsaviation.co.uk/history/  These two lovely guys along with all the other people behind the scenes at East Kirkby Museum really made the day a success and my thanks go to them and all the wonderful re-enactors who were truly awesome and added real atmosphere to the event. Sean asked me on Twitter to make sure I made myself known to him when we arrived as he wanted to meet dad. Sean is so passionate about Bomber Command as you will see from reading his tweets and what he doesn't know about the Lancaster isn't worth knowing.

Sean and Dad. You can see the turret where dad used to sit above

Dad standing beneath his beloved Lancaster

This was Dad's Mid-upper gunner position in the Turret

Here are just some of the links of the awesome pics which came through my Twitter stream after the event. These are the "hardcore" photographers' pics and you can certainly see the difference to our amateur pics. I'm gutted we missed getting a pic of the 7 crew as we took a comfort break but some of the pics in these links really give you a feel of what it was like to go out on a bombing mission.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/photosbydylan 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/yorkshireflyer/sets/72157629242674810/with/6845368580/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/zymurgy661/sets/72157629609607213/

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2119392/A-modern-day-mission-Lancaster-bomber-crew-prepares-action-70-years-remarkable-set-airfield-pictures.html

What better way to finish my blog is to tell you briefly about my night out with the Pathfinders. By coincidence just a week after this photography event was the 70th Anniversary Dinner of the formation of the Pathfinders at RAF Wyton. Dad went to it alone last year but this year he had the opportunity to invite a guest. After mum declined, he asked me and I jumped at the chance.

What a fantastic night it was and oh boy can those RAF people drink! It was a truly humbling experience being in the company of 18 Pathfinders. RAF Wyton, the home of the Pathfinders, is so very proud of them all, as am I. The speeches were very moving in the respect and reverence shown to the original Pathfinders for whom this event was held. 

The next event we will be attending will be the Dedication and Unveiling of The Bomber Command Memorial in Green Park on 28th June. http://www.bombercommand.com/ to honour the 55,573 men of Bomber Command who lost their lives in World War II. This has been a long time coming to truly honour those brave souls.

Granddad's WW1 Diary

Having loaded the “kids”in the back of the car we set off on our adventure to Belgium.

Armed with a transcription of Granddad’s diary from the trenches during WW1 we planned to visit some of the places mentioned in his diary, i.e. La Bassee, Bethune, Gorigue and Bailleul. Granddad survived the war by the way but died in 1968.

We picked the wrong weekend to go with putting the clocks forward as we had to forward one hour when we arrived in France on the Friday, then ANOTHER hour on Saturday! Poor mum was totally confused what time it was as she hadn't changed her "English" watch time. So funny, bless her!

Driving through France was an experience when we hit the motorway. We saw a sign “Péage” and read it as Plage, thinking it was a beach but was in fact a toll as we later discovered! We pulled into the barriers and panicked a bit when it said “ticket” - ermm ... what blooming ticket? There was a queue of cars forming behind, putting pressure on us while we tried to work out what we needed to do. Then we spied a button flashing, so pressed said button and voila the ticket popped out, thus lifting the barrier. “Bloody Eeenglish!” we could almost hear them saying in the queue of traffic forming behind us!

We managed to find a few of the places mentioned in granddad’s diary and actually found reference to a date on 26^th June 1916 when his Regiment, Royal Warwickshire Regiment was relieved by Oxford & Bucks Light Infantry. We found a grave of a poor lad who died on the 26^th June 1916 from Oxford & Bucks Light Infantry, it could so easily have been granddad. That was quite heartbreaking to see.



Laventie Military Cemetery



We then visited Hill 62 close to our Hotel in Ypres where original WW1 trenches can be found.



The cat you see in this picture was our tour cat. He took us round the whole site of WW1 trenches, then after we'd finished he showed us round the museum ... so funny!





A couple of old relics





As you can see, mum's right arm is in plaster. She managed to break her wrist a week before we went!





This was the haunting site when we left Hill 62, still chokes me up seeing it now



Hotel Kasteelhofthooghe

When back to our Hotel (above) I got on Twitter via free wireless network and tweeted some photos. I mentioned Menin Gate in one tweet and got a tweet back from a fireman in Manchester (who I wasn’t following at the time) who asked if I could visit his Great Uncle of Leinster Regiment at Menin Gate (panel 44). The following evening we took a trip to Menin Gate and found his uncle, G. Glanfield on panel 44 and I tweeted a picture to him. He was so pleased and I was so thrilled to have been able to do this for him. It was so heartwarming to do this simple act for him.

On Saturday we visited our friends, Dirk and his wife Mieke. Dirk is the author of the book mentioned in my November Blog. We had a lovely lunch which Mieke cooked for us. Dirk then took Dad and Chris to Kemmel to visit an old bunker (mum would not have been able to manage all the steps) so Mieke took us to visit the fascinating cigarette Museum in an old Windmill which is where Mieke works. We then visited the memorial for the civilians who were lost during the raid on Courtrai which dad was on (see November blog) and spent the rest of the evening in the charming company of Dirk and Mieke.

The following day we visited the beautifiul city of Ghent and had our own personal tour guides! A few weeks ago I “met” on Twitter a lovely girl by the name of Sofie who by coincidence lived in Belgium. I tweeted with her a few times asking her the best places to visit in Belgium and mentioned we were going to Ghent on the Sunday. Imagine my surprise when she said she had spoken to her husband,Thierry, and offered to guide us round the sights! How kind was that! We jumped at the chance and arranged to meet outside the Cathedral.




The massive Sint-Baafskathedraal (St. Bavo's Cathedral) is the most interesting of several notable churches in Ghent. Built in the 14th and 15th centuries in the Gothic style, the cathedral contains a wealth of religious art.





Thierry and Sofie

 

Shame about the scaffolding!


The GRAVENSTEEN is the Dutch name for the 'castle of the count'. The counts of Flanders had castles built in the principal cities of the county. Because they had to maintain law and order, they continuously had to move from one city to the other. Therefore, they disposed of a castle in most cities where they wanted to stay for a few months. The castle of Ghent is the only one which survived the centuries more or less intact.

 

Taken from inside the Castle looking out



The weather couldn't have been more perfect





Sofie and Sandy









We had a fantastic time touring the wonderful sights of Ghent







On Monday it was time to go home.

We popped into beautiful Ypres for a bit of last-minute shopping and ....





a fabulous Belgium waffle - well, it would've been rude not to!



We took the Dunkirk route home with a view to finding the memorial for the evacuation of Dunirk during  Operation Dynamo It was a tad warmer than the last time we were on this beach in November!





She was happy .... honest!



 

 

Mum loves this pic. She asked "who took it?" Erm.....

So that was our amazing trip to Belgium once again. Hope to visit again shortly.
With thanks to Dirk & Mieke and Sofie & Thierry and also Twitter!

Twitter Fun

Over the last 4 months or so I have had the absolute pleasure of “meeting” some amazing people on Twitter and have had the best laughs! Real roll on the floor laughing or ROFL as I see alot these days! Those of you that know me know I have a naughty sense of humour so I can only apologise if I offend anyone. Some of my Twitter buddies are already learning that! I just can’t help myself sometimes. *Grin*  I even resorted to changing my Avatar to a nurse to nurse a sick goblin who had been involved in a hit and run - long story! The naughty little goblin has nicknamed me Nurse Randy now *can’t think why* … He is such a funny, cute and lovable creature. In Twitterworld I even stopped the night with him and he brought me tea and crumpets in bed!

I have also done a “Carry On Nurse” special - (you know who you are) to a lovely funny guy who I “met” on Twitter whilst going round Tescos on Friday night. Apparently I made him choke on his crisps when I replied to one of his tweets whilst I was in the sausage department. I ended up performing what is now known as the “Hymy thingy” on him! - all because I couldn’t think how to spell it and predictive text comes up with some weird suggestions - so funny! Thank you for making me laugh so much my cheeky patient!

I’ve got a lot to thank Twitter for. I don’t use it as a business tool which I know to be a powerful thing. It is purely for pleasure and I’m enjoying it tremendously.

If I hadn’t been following @BCCare I wouldn’t have been lucky to be picked out of a hat for an invitation to go to the Pink Party (to raise awareness of Breast Cancer) at the Sanctuary, Covent Garden on 5th October last (a year to the day that I was diagnosed) I was also one of the lucky 4 ladies who had a photo shoot with Reveal Magazine and a full pampering session, including hair and makeup so thank you Breast Cancer Care, especially Sheryl Plant who is absolutely lovely - she's a twitterer too!   I also wouldn’t have met the wonderful the other ladies going through the same thing and the wonderful people who give up their valuable time to help BC sufferers. I was also lucky enough to win an Award for my first ever Blog, so thank you BC Care.

I have also met some lovely cat people, in particular @YourFirstPA (Laura) who, last September, tweeted that her one of her beloved 3 cats, Tawnie had been shot. It upset me so much and I tweeted her constantly for progress reports. Thankfully Tawnie made a complete recovery, but it was touch and go there for a couple of days. I was distraught (as was she) and I wanted to do something to help so sent her a donation towards the vet bill. Apparently this act of kindness made Laura cry but I can assure you I shed as many tears as her I think.

Completely out of the blue on Sunday afternoon I had a lovely comment on my first blog (last September) from someone I didn’t even know but who left their Twitter address. I immediately responded via Twitter and have made 2 new friends because of this, so thank you! Apparently the lady who left the comment had been recommended the legal secretarial services of another Twitterer, so she clicked on their timeline and apparently liked my Twitter name so started following me - amazing! See the power Twitter has, and it doesn’t just have to be for fun, it can be used for business too.

Chris @ChrisJHornby and I are having a Tweetup (meet-up) this coming Friday with a couple of twits we’ve never met before but feel like we know them! We're really looking forward to it.

My commute to London and back is such an enjoyable experience because of Twitter. The journey goes so quick that I’ve very nearly missed my stop on a few occasions. I was on a bus just before Christmas destined for the new Shopping Centre in the City and nearly ended up in Ilford (all due to Twitter!)

Thank you to all my special Twitter buddies (you know who you are) for making me laugh, cry and wet myself rolling on the floor laughing. I can’t possibly mention all of you, unless you want me to *wink*

My phone has never seen so much action!