Bear-sized Trains!

Last weekend, Polar helped us into our bear bag and sat us on the back seat of the car, alongside a bag of clothes and her camera bag.

'Where are we going?' Hanley asked.  We guessed it might be an overnight adventure.

'We are visiting our friends Chrissie and Alan,' said Grizzly.

I was very pleased, because I remembered giving Chrissie some flowers when they visited Uppie.  They are also the human guardians of my friend Cameo, who is a Welsh Springer Spaniel.  I met Cameo last year during my voyage on Uppie the narrowboat, but she had not met Hanley or Endon and I was rather worried she might think they were toys for her to chew and bite them before I could properly introduce them!

'We should all stay in Polar and Grizzly's room at first, just in case,' I said to the other bears.  We made ourselves a cosy bear bed out of some lovely fluffy towels and although we could smell scrummy soup, we didn't come down for lunch.

The humans spent almost all afternoon talking to each other and, in the evening, went out for dinner.  When they had gone, I climbed down the stairs and found Cameo, resting in her doggy bed after a long walk.  

'If I bring my friends to meet you, you won't bite them, will you?' I asked.

She promised not too, and soon the smaller bears and I were chatting away happily with her, hearing all about her adventures on her narrowboat and the walks she likes through the orchards and across the fields.  She even shared some of her dog-biscuits with us, although we had trouble gnawing through them.  However, when she said how much she liked chasing squirrels Hanley and Endon got quite nervous, as Endon is very fluffy and could be mistaken for one if he had a bigger tail.  This seemed a good point to go back up to our room.

Cameo told us her humans had a surprise for us the next day, so we settled down for an early sleep.  In the morning, Chrissie drove us to a garden centre, but we had not come to look at the plants.  There was a wonderful miniature railway running lots of small bear-sized engines.  We were so excited!

'Can we drive one?' asked Hanley Bear, who had already chosen a little red engine he wanted.

'There is too much hot coal and steam about for small bears to be engine drivers,' said Grizzly.  'But we can certainly travel behind, as passengers.'   

We thought the humans looked funny sitting in the little waggons, which were a much better size for small bears and human cubs than grown ups.  We had a lovely journey, waving to the big railway bears who helped to look after the grounds and watching the other steam engines following us.  

We waited patiently in our bear bag, talking to Cameo, while Polar took photos of the other steam engines and Grizzly talked to the drivers.  'It was my idea to come here,' said Cameo.  'I can't go on the trains, but I knew you would like them.'

'That was a very kind thought,' I replied.  'I hope you can have a nice walk and some treats as a reward.'

We got caramel shortbread for elevenses and then we did have a nice walk, through a pretty village full of funny little houses with roofs made of straw.  We also found some big quinces and some sweet chestnuts on the ground, which we smuggled into Grizzly's rucksack when he wasn't looking.  

As we were driven back to Cameo's house, we saw a hot air balloon being launched.  'That will fly right over our house,' Cameo told us. 'Climb up on the hedge for a good look!'

As soon as we got to Cameo's house we scrambled out of our bear bag and, sure enough, the balloon flew over us.

'Wow!' cried little Endon Bear.  'Wouldn't that be fun?'

Hanley Bear agreed but I wasn't so sure.  I'm quite a cautious small bear and I like to keep my paws on solid ground, except when I am on a canal boat!

 

A Trip to Styal Mill

It is very windy and wet today, so not a good day for having Small Bear Adventures.  Instead, it is a good day for writing about Small Bear Adventures and, as we have had lots recently, I had better get to work!

The weekend after our brilliant day out on the Severn Valley Railway, Polar and Grizzly took us bears with them on a drive towards Manchester.  Hanley Bear thought he knew where he was going, as he had been with Polar to a conference in Manchester.  He started chattering away about the busy city roads and very tall buildings we would see, until we turned off of the main road and he had to admit he was lost. 

Polar and Grizzly weren't lost.  They were heading for a National Trust property at Styal called Quarry Bank Mill, where there are lovely gardens and grounds and a working cotton mill.  Grizzly told us we would have to stay in our bear bag inside the mill, as there was moving machinery that might trap or crush silly small bears, but we could run about and explore the gardens.

These were full of beautiful late summer flowers and there was fruit and vegetables too.  Our favourites were the big orange pumpkins, which we could climb on and slide down.  We nibbled some tasty apples and salad leaves, which was a little bit naughty of us as the gardeners had worked very hard putting fences and gates up to stop small animals like us getting in and eating their crops.

Outside the garden was a steep, wooded valley with a fast-flowing river at the bottom.  We loved it here, as there were trees to climb, springy moss to jump on and more pretty flowers to sniff and admire.  

There was a big statue of a crocodile too.  We thought it was a real one at first and were very scared that it might eat us, or even eat Polar and Grizzly, until we saw some human cubs climbing on it.

Polar put us back in the bear bag when we got to the mill.  We read some very sad things about how very bad humans kept other humans as slaves and made them grow and pick the cotton, and how poor little human cubs had to work in the mill, dashing about between the machines to pick up loose cotton and fluff, and often getting hurt.  We hoped the human cubs would have had their own small bears, to hug and comfort them at the end of their busy and dangerous day when they went back to their apprentice house.  

We were glad there were no human cubs working in the mill now, just very clever grown-ups who tell visitors about how the machines spin the fluffy cotton into thread, then weave the threads into fabric.  It is all very ingenious but very, very noisy!  

We covered our ears with our paws when the machines started working.  The electricity to power everything comes from a modern water-turbine but the original water wheel and the old steam engines are still in place under the spinning and weaving floor.  

Some steam engines were working, making hissing and gurgling noises, which we bears thought was great fun, although we stayed well away from the hot metal and steam, in case we burnt our fur.

After tea and cake, Polar and Grizzly went to the shop and bought some small squares of fabric made at the mill.  Polar says the stripy ones are for making us pyjamas and that she might make us new aprons out of the ones with vegetable patterns on, but not until Christmas, as she has to take up the legs of some new trousers Grizzly has bought first.  We keep checking the bag to see if she has started making our things yet, but the special cotton is still in its bundle of small squares.  We will have to be patient bears! 

Bears on Trains

After our visit to Dorset, Polar and Grizzly started to drive us home.  It was a very windy day and we were sometimes a little scared during our journey, although our human guardians drove very carefully.  Polar showed us the cottage where her great-granddad used to live, in a small town called Sturminster Newton.  

When we stopped for lunch, we made a quick visit to the Abbey at Malmesbury and met a group of small bear monks!  Then we drove north through Worcestershire, passing near Leominster and Ludlow, which was very pretty countryside.  We asked Polar if we could visit again one day and she said we might.

That night, we stayed in a lovely little hotel with a beautiful garden, with plans to visit the Cosford RAF Museum in the morning.  While our human guardians had their dinner, we bears read through all the tourist information leaflets in the room.

'Look!' cried Hanley Bear.  'There's a Steam Gala on the Severn Valley Railway this weekend.  We had better tell Grizzly.  He loves trains even more than planes.'

Grizzly was very grateful to us and the next morning, we went back to Bridgnorth.  There was a steam engine waiting to leave with a train of lovely old-fashioned carriages.  Polar likes old trains too, because she says they have more leg room than modern trains.  We like them, because they have little tables and arm-rests that make great seats for small bears.

Endon was a little frightened of the engine at first, but Hanley and I had seen steam engines before, so told him that steam engines are quite safe for small bears.  We all enjoyed the first part of our trip down to Highley, where we visited the museum and engine sheds.  

When we got inside the museum, Polar let us out to look around.  We promised to be good bears and stay out of trouble while she took photos of passing trains from the balcony.  Hanley spotted a bright red locomotive which he decided to explore.

I climbed up onto another locomotive, which I saw was built  in Crewe, which is not far from Grizzly and Polar's house.

Endon Bear found an engine that he liked too, and climbed up to look at all the pipes and valves.  We thought it was a funny shape, as it had a square-shaped body, while the others were all round.  Grizzly told us it was called a 'pannier tank'.

After we had pretended to drive our trains for a little while, Hanley, Endon and I ran along to see the carriages in the museum.  We couldn't find a way into the royal train carriage but we did explore the Royal Mail mobile sorting office.

'If I sit here, I wonder if I'll get sent back to Stoke-on-Trent?' said Hanley.

'I don't know about that,' I said.  'If we stay here too long, we'll miss our next steam train journey.  Polar and Grizzly will be looking for us to take us back to the station.'

Soon, we were on our way again, heading to Kidderminster.  By now, it was raining quite hard so we couldn't enjoy the view, but we liked smelling the steam from the engine and waving to the people inside the trains we passed.  

A little way from Kidderminster, we passed over the River Severn.  Polar told us that she hoped we could visit on Uppie one day, although you cannot come this far up the river safely by boat.

When we arrived in Kidderminster, we could get a close look at our locomotive, the fantastic Duchess of Sutherland.  We thought it was a magnificent engine.

'I wonder what will haul our train back to Bridgnorth?' said little Endon.

I didn't mind, as long as we had nice springy seats to jump on in our carriage!

 These lovely teak carriages were perfect for us bears.  There were arm-rests in the compartments that made perfect bear platforms where we could stand and look out of the window.

Hanley was fascinated by the way the windows opened, using a leather strap, although he had to stop playing with it, as it started raining again as we left the station.  As we couldn't see out very well, we decided to spend a lot of the return journey playing bear games and climbing on things.  We got right up into the luggage rack!  If you look carefully, you might see us again, reflected in the mirror underneath us.

It was very wet when we got back to Bridgnorth.  Polar took some more photographs while Grizzly sheltered us bears by putting the bear bag - and us - inside his rucksack.  It was very, very rainy all the way home but we were happy little bears after our fun day out and soon fell fast asleep on the back seat of Polar and Grizzly's little red car.