After Richard

Still discussing the previous night’s performance of Richard III on Saturday we drove across country via Ipstones and Longnor to Buxton. We parked easily up on the park, near the war memorial and wandered down into town. After a meander round the shops and a coffee we went into the Pavilion to look at the Family History Fair. I was hoping that the Birmingham and Midlands lot would be there but no joy so my Hodgetts from 1841 backwards still remain a mystery. I’ve done all I can on Ancestry so have now to look at parish records which in turn means braving New Street Station to get to the archives and I’m not a great fan of New Street Station. We spoke to quite a few people on the many stalls on offer and generally enjoyed ourselves.

On Sunday we took a break from tiling the hallway floor to pop up into Hanley to watch the aircraft of the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight fly over the Potteries Museum where a new statue of local hero Reginald Mitchell designer of the Spitfire had been unveiled. We stood opposite the museum in what used to be the burial ground of the Bethesda Chapel, now a lovely landscaped garden. There were loads of people milling around and it was great to see representatives of all generations eagerly anticipating the aircraft. A huge ‘whoop’ went up from the crowd as the planes flew proudly and sedately overhead and then a huge wave of applause as they disappeared over the rooftops into the sky beyond.

This morning we got up early and decided to walk around the lake at Trentham before all the crowds got there later today. We saw herons nesting, and the geese and swans were proudly displaying their little ones for our delight. After steaming hot coffee at the lakeside café we drove back home past the queue of cars struggling to find parking spaces in the pouring rain.