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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 4 years

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NYNY. So good we'd stay there twice...

NYNY. So good we’d stay there twice…

If you are looking for a good hotel in Las Vegas, then I’m afraid to say you are spoiled for choice. And we are no experts, as we’ve only been the once, and we’ve only had one experience of a hotel over there. But it was a good experience, so we will tell you more…

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 4 years

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For a long time one of Great Britain’s best kept secrets, when the activities of Bletchley Park were final revealed to all after it was declassified under the Official Secrets Act, a race was underway to restore the rapidly decaying huts where hundreds of men and women (mostly women) served relentlessly to decipher enemy messages which were to shorten the war significantly.

Many years later, and after many years of tireless restoration, the Park now stands to inform and commemorate many unsung heroes of the second world war.

My own interest in Bletchley came about after watching the film Enigma, with Kate Winslet, and subsequently the TV series ‘The Bletchley Circle’ and most recently ‘The Illustration Game’, which gives a brief biopic of the short and somewhat sad life of Alan Turing. It’s been a place on my ‘bucket list’ for quite a while, so it was nice to finally get a chance to cross this one off the list.

Entering the park, you immediately get a sense of the understated, discrete nature of the place. Very little signage on approach and a barrier on the entrance makes you feel like you are entering a still operational secret facility.

The Park itself is quite large, and took us a good 2 1/2 hours to get round – and we could have easily spent the same again had we chose to watch every video, read every display and tried every interactive demo that was on show.

Following the recommended route, we started at the top of the park where the beautiful old Mansion sits, which has a family history of its own, with rooms set out exactly how they would have been back in the forties. The sound effects that fill each room are cleverly done, with good quality audio really making you feel like the original occupants are right there with you, busily at work.

The library is quite something else, still stocked with books from the period in wall to wall glass doored wooden bookcases.

Round the back are the garages with some fine examples of vintage cars, trucks and motorcycles, including the open top Sunbeam Tourer used in the film “Enigma”, which was donated by Mick Jagger.

Continue past the old tennis courts (with eerie extremely realistic sounds of a match taking place from hidden speakers), you come to various exhibitions in the old huts, demonstrating the conditions that the staff worked in for many years.

Again, the sound effects are spooky, with sounds of footsteps on the wooden floors, and enhanced by video footage of characters from the period projected on the walls behind desks, or stood having conversations in offices, totally unaware of your presence eavesdropping on them.

There was a temporary exhibition on in the teletype hall, which detailed the activity of Bletchley leading up to the D-Day landings and the year afterwards until Germany and Japan surrendered.

The D-Day display culminated in a video presentation, and the multi-projector / multi-screen movie footage, a mixture of new footage and vintage news reel, was reminiscent of my visit to the Buchenwald concentration camp. Although not quite as heart-rending, it was still poignant, and brought home not only the effectiveness of the work of the codebreakers by not just breaking the German codes but also feeding them false information, but the fact that the soldiers on the front line were totally unaware of their existence and could not appreciate the difference they were making to the war on the ground.

Of course, everyone now thinks they know the story of Alan Turing, brilliantly portrayed by Benedict Cumberbatch, but two things are obvious from the Bletchley experience. Firstly, there was much more to Alan Turing than the film displayed, and he actually went on to do other things before his untimely arrest and subsequent death. One piece of text on display is a copy of his only published paper “The chemical basis of morphogenesis” which explores why mathematical patterns exist in nature. That he was a genius could not be in doubt, with the two sides of the book on display comprising of multiple and (to the layman) seemingly meaningless equations, which probably say more than volumes of text ever could.

The second revelation is that Bletchley isn’t all about Turing. Although a part of it is devoted to his “Bombe” decryption machine invention that features in the Illustration Game move (I didn’t see any reference to it being called ‘Christopher’), there is much more to see, and you come to realise that there were many more discoveries and famous events emanating from the park.

One example of this has to be the breaking of the Lorenz machine.

Everyone has heard of Enigma, a German code machine which had three rotating electro-mechanical cylinders used to produce the ‘unbreakable’ code. Enigma was used all over the war, with Italian, German, Spanish and even Japanese versions – and Bletchley apparently has the largest collection of Enigma machines around, in many different versions of the original machine.

While Enigma was used routinely on the war fronts to send and receive messages, the important information passing between the upper levels of the German government used an even stronger encryption, using a TWELVE cylinder machine called Lorenz.

A significant part of the exhibition focuses on the work of Bill Tutte, who was responsible for breaking this more difficult cipher, AND producing the first properly digital electronic computing machine, the real forerunner to the present day computer.

Also on site is the National Radio Centre, a sort of side-stall of an exhibition which has some very good demonstration displays and a good range of historical artefacts all relating to the development of modern day radio communications. What was particular interest to me was a live demonstration of an Amateur Radio Station, where two very proficient guys gave a live demo of current shortwave radio equipment, listening in on live stations and interpreting (translating?) morse code right in front of us, as if it was just someone speaking English to them. Amateur Radio has certainly moved on since when I was interested in it back in the 80’s. I wonder if they class themselves as ‘Radio Hams’? One of them apparently ran the amateur radio club at Cambridge University! Anyway, a big thanks to them for an interesting chat.

And of course you have to end with the obligatory gift shop and cafeteria. The gift shop had some interesting retro stuff on sale – who can remember playing ‘Beatle’? Brought back some memories I can tell you!

Bletchley Park may not appeal to everybody, but if you have an interest in the history of the second world war, this is a place that must be on your ‘to do’ list.

Visit the Bletchley Park Website.

XDF EDD REC BLE TCH LYP ARK… For a long time one of Great Britain's best kept secrets, when the activities of Bletchley Park were final revealed to all after it was declassified under the Official Secrets Act, a race was underway to restore the rapidly decaying huts where hundreds of men and women (mostly women) served relentlessly to decipher enemy messages which were to shorten the war significantly.

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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Sue's Vegas Surprise Part 2

Sue’s Vegas Surprise Part 2

Did the earth move for you? I can’t believe we were in the middle of an earthquake and didn’t realise it! See this and more in the last part of Sue’s surprise trip to vegas.

Don’t forget to subscribe!

and if you forgot to watch part 1…

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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Ireland is a destination that has long been in our sights, but we’ve just never got around to it. This was reinforced when I experienced a brief taste while working in County Wexford a couple of years back.

The final decision was made after a flying visit from my Czech friend Joe, who had just spent six weeks touring Ireland and Scotland in his camper van. On his way home he stopped off for a cuppa, and we hatched a plan for him and his wife to fly over this year for a tour of the Scottish highlands, with me offering to be the chauffeur for the week. However, we soon found that suitably priced accommodation was hard to find along our planned route – a rethink was obviously required.

Our Irish tour was hatched in December. We picked a date in May, Joe booked his flights to Dublin and we booked a ferry from Holyhead to Dublin.

I then spent most of the winter months trying to work out a route. Joe had a couple of places on his visit wish list. I had a couple of my own to add to it. Between us we formulated a round trip from Dublin, taking in as many sights as possible.

I booked various places to stay on booking.com, and using the free cancellation, we tweaked and re-tweaked our route until we agreed on a final itinerary.

While Joe knew the Ireland well after many tours in his van over the last few years, I only had my brief experience of Wexford and the surrounding area to go by. Were we in for a surprise!

Our tour began with the drive up to Holyhead, about 3 1/2 hours plus a 30 minute stop at the Stockport McDonalds for breakfast.

A very smooth crossing with Stenaline had us quickly disembarking in the port of Dublin right on time at 5 pm, just in time for the quick drive to the airport, where Joe and his wife Renata had just landed.

Cases in the boot, introductions made (Sue had not met Renata before), we set off for our first stop in Camolin, an easy drive down the M50.

Note: If you are intending on Irish motorways, remember some of them have tolls, so don’t forget to register online with eflow to pay them. It is so easy and takes all the worry out of paying.

Next thing to remember is, DON’T PAY ATTENTION TO THE SAT NAV!

Despite seeing the sign for the M50, I foolishly followed the satnav and ended up driving straight through the city centre. Not a pleasant drive (although our guests enjoyed the impromptu city tour!).

This added a good half hour to our drive, but fortunately the owner of our first B&B was very accommodating, and even called to check where we were.

Arriving at the “Kilbora” bed and breakfast in Camolin, Anne Marie wasted no time giving us a whirlwind tour of the rooms and our keys, before pointing us towards the “Courtyard” restaurant in the village of Fern, so that we could get dinner before they stopped serving.

And what a wonderful first meal it was! Fed and watered, we headed back to the B&B for a well earned rest before day two of our tour…

Rob and Sue visited Ireland in May 2019.

Irish Tour – Part 1 Ireland is a destination that has long been in our sights, but we've just never got around to it.

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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I don’t want to make a habit of reviewing the same places over and over again, but I;m making an exception in the case of Paradise Lake Lodges.

Since our last visit in 2017 which you can read here, there’s been a change in management and some interesting developments are on the horizon.

On this occasion we stayed in Woodland View 1, a larger 6-berth lodge with hot tub, tucked down in a secluded corner of the lodge lake.

Now, there’s been a lot of comments left on tripadvisor and other sites regarding the previous owners. In fairness, we met them during our original stay, and we didn’t have any issue with them, but clearly a lot of people seemed to be upset with their attitude.

Nothing could be further from the truth on our arrival last weekend – with a new bright and welcoming log cabin reception instead of the dingy little office we had to go to last time, the new team were friendly, welcoming and professional. We completed the check in process in a matter of minutes and were escorted to the lodge where we had a quick demonstration of the hot tub controls.

I must admit the previous visit lacked a little bit of the welcome and concentrated more on whether you were abiding by the fishing rules, so this personal touch was nice to see.

Similarly on check-out we had another pleasant exchange and we certainly would recommend a visit.

We noticed that some of the furniture in the lodge was new (like the leather sofas), and quite possibly some of the fixture and fittings (e,g, bathroom), and while on our first visit only two of the lodges had hot tubs, we could already see them springing up around the other lodges.

A new cluster of lodges is planned for one of the woodland areas, and we spoke to the new team about their ideas for upgrading the large house on site.

Podland continues to provide good quality accommodation at very reasonable prices around its own smaller lake.

And the fishing? We managed to catch a reasonable selection of Roach, Rudd, Bream and possibly even a Dace, but unfortunately on this occasion there were no big carp to photograph, although we had one or two cheeky encounters which left us wanting a return visit next year!

Verdict: A firm favourite, recommended for its proximity to York and local attractions, while maintaining a quiet and peaceful environment and crystal clear lakes for fishing enthusiasts.

Review: Return To Paradise (Lake Lodges!) I don't want to make a habit of reviewing the same places over and over again, but I;m making an exception in the case of Paradise Lake Lodges.

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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Coming soon: Return to Paradise It's been two years but I've been hoping to return to Paradise Lake Lodges and have another go at the huge carp in the lake, so here we are again, this time in a bigger lodge with hot tub and with my brother, sister in law and mother in tow.

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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Oops – So unorganised! Just pointing one of my friends to our travel blog and I thought - it's been so long that I can't actually remember the website address!

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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Sue's Vegas Birthday Surprise!

Sue’s Vegas Birthday Surprise!

Oops! I’m so busy making videos that I forgot to post the link to our video on our website. This is the first part of our surprise trip to Vegas – well, it wasn’t a surprise to me of course, but it certainly was for Sue – we hope you enjoy and keep watching out for part two appearing soon.

Sue’s Vegas Surprise – Part 1

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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Review: Kilbora B&B, Camolin, Ireland

A few minutes south of the village of Camolin, on the east side of Ireland about 90 minutes from Dublin, nestled in picturesque open fields with views of the countryside in all directions, you will find the Kilbora B&B owned by Anne Marie, offering four spacious and well appointed double or king size ground floor rooms.

Although on the busy N11 road from Dublin to Wexford, road noise is at a…

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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Touring the Emerald Isle...

Touring the Emerald Isle…

Well, we’ve just got back from a lovely week in Ireland, now for the job of producing the numerous B&B and hotel reviews as well as putting together our next video.

While you are patiently waiting for them to appear, here’s a few photo’s to keep you going:

Ireland Tour 2019

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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Video review – Gulliver Land It's a little late for Easter but if you are looking for a nice day out with the kids this summer you won't go far wrong at Gulliver Land.

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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The Archives – A little piece of history A long time ago, we visited our friends Jim and Marie in Vineland, New Jersey, and while we were there we visited Jim's local fire station where he was a volunteer fire fighter.

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 5 years

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World Traveller – The Archives Hi - Well, 2019 is well upon us and I haven't posted anything yet on the blog - which of course is a blogger "no,no" but sometimes you have to be patient, don't you?

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 6 years

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Video review : Warner Bros Tour

HARRY POTTER!

I just love that scene in the first film where he visits Diagon Alley for the first time with everyone recognising Harry.

In fact I just love the whole Harry Potter thing – from the books that were so mesmerising to read, to the films which so carefully and faithfully translated every detail and brought it to the big screen.

This is my second time to the studio tour, and Sue’s…

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 6 years

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TUI - Result!!! (No, sorry, just kidding)

TUI – Result!!! (No, sorry, just kidding)

So, if you’ve been following my TUI blog and tweets you will know that we had some appalling service from TUI during our Ibiza holiday and I felt compelled to complain to them about it. Yes, me, complain! It’s unheard of! (more…)

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 6 years

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YouTube is getting interesting!

Had a pleasant surprise today when I checked my YouTube site. Firstly the hotel chain where we stayed in Mexico had posted a comment saying they liked my video of our stay and asked if they could use it in their marketing, social media sites and websites… (more…)

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rob-and-sues-worldtraveller-blog · 6 years

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TUI or not TUI, that is the question...

TUI or not TUI, that is the question…

Dotting the ‘i’s and crossing the ‘t’s is inference to someone paying very close attention to the smallest of details. The irony cannot be overstated in our latest sojourn to Ibiza in the less than capable hands of TUI, who we affectionately remember as Thomsons from years gone past… (more…)

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