A Trip to Lincolnshire

After our visit to Grandad Polar, we didn't come straight home.  Polar and Grizzly drove us up to Lincolnshire instead.

 

This was for a sad reason.  One of Grizzly's best pals, who he met when they were in the RAF together in the 1960s, had passed away and they were attending his funeral.  

Grizzly's pal Terry had stayed in the RAF and become a pilot and instructor, often flying a very big plane called the Orion, and had adventures all over the world.  He also had a family who all loved him very much and lots of friends, because he was a kind, generous and often very funny man.  

He was also very clever and did lots of research about the First World War, including finding someone who could read old-fashioned shorthand to decipher a diary kept by Grandad Grizzly about his time in the trenches, so Grizzly's family owe him a great debt of gratitude too.  We met Mr Terry - or we should say, Flight Lieutenant Terry - when we went to Belgium in 2018 for the centenary of the Battle of Kemmel, where Grandad Grizzly fought.

On the way to our B&B pub, we passed through Lutterworth.  We all jumped because we thought this plane was flying very low over us, but it was just a statue of the first jet aircraft designed by Mr Frank Whittle.

   

We were all tired after our journey and glad that there was a nice, comfy bed waiting for us in our room while our humans had their dinner.  From the window, we had a nice view across the fields and could see humans riding horses, and lots of sheep.

In the morning, before the funeral, Polar drove Grizzly (and us) out to see the countryside and the airfield at Scampton, famous for being the base of the Dambusters in the Second World War and now home to the Red Arrows.

They had been practicing first thing in the morning and a local photographer we met said they were due to fly again soon.  He showed us a brilliant place where we could watch them and take photos.

One plane took off on its own and soon it was doing all sorts of clever manoeuvres, training smoke so we could see the shapes it was making.  We could see there were two people on board.

 

We were sad when the display finished but, very soon afterwards, five planes took off together! 

We all cheered as we knew we were in for another amazing display.

They flew much higher than the single plane to do their manoeuvres but we still had a super view.  We thought Grizzly's old pal would have been pleased we had spent the morning watching such clever pilots.

In the afternoon, we stayed at our nice pub while Polar and Grizzly went to the funeral, being quiet bears and thinking about how sad our humans and their friends must be.

In the morning, Polar went out to photograph the sunrise, as there are big skies in this part of Lincolnshire because there aren't many hills. After breakfast, it was time to go home, but our human guardians said we would make a little adventure of the journey.

The first place we stopped was Torksey Lock, which links the River Trent with the Fossdyke.  The Fossdyke is the oldest canal in Britain because the Romans built it, to link the Trent to the River Witham.

Huddlesford and I went to explore with Polar and Grizzly, while the smaller bears stayed in the car, since it was very cold.  We hoped we might get cake and hot chocolate, but the café at the lock was closed.

You can see how interesting it is here.  The lock between the river and the Fossdyke is quite a big one and was quite deep when we visited, but sometimes the river floods and can be as high as the Fossdyke - or even higher!

Our human guardians decided to have a walk a little way along the river.  Hanley Bear decided he wanted to join us for this, to see the River Trent, and was amazed to see the name of the local council.

"Fenton is one of our Six Towns of Stoke-on-Trent," he said.  "Are we near Stoke?"  

When he saw how big the river was here, he could tell he was still a long way from from his city, as it was so much wider and deeper than it is close to our home.  It was even bigger than when I had seen it in Nottingham.

"Wow!" cried Hanley.  "It's massive!  It would be scary to bring Uppie down here!"

Polar and Grizzly explained that there was another thing that would make it tricky to bring Uppie here - the Trent is tidal below Cromwell Lock near Newark, making the current stronger at times, and there are sand bars where you can run aground as the tide falls.  I don't think we will ever come here on Uppie, unless we travel with another boat whose crew know it well.

There are some interesting buildings beside the river, including several big power stations with their huge cooling towers, and the ruined manor house of Torksey Castle.

Walking back towards the car park, we saw there were very good moorings on the channel leading to the lock, where boats could tie up before using the lock, or as a safe place to stop between the tides when travelling up or down the river.

Grizzly drove and Polar navigated us from Lincolnshire, over the toll bridge into Nottinghamshire and through Sherwood  Forest into Derbyshire.  We saw the famous twisted spire of the church in Chesterfield, which we had spotted from the train when we visited Sheffield.

Our human guardians stopped for a tea-break in Bakewell.  As they had stayed in the car at the lock, we bears decided Endon and Waverley ought to go to the cake shop with them while the rest of us had naps.  

But we wished we had all gone, as they tucked into Bakewell Pudding with ice-cream!  Perhaps we'll go back another day and all try some?