Beamish

We decided to take the opportunity to have a day out and all agreed on Beamish which is an open air museum, telling the story of life in North East England in the 1820s, 1900s and 1940s. The last time I visited was December 1991 when I was 15 years old and did a Cross Country race there! I distinctly remember the day as I met someone I greatly admired at the time, Liz McColgan. She had had a tremendous summer season winning the gold medal at the Tokyo World Championships in the 10,000m, not long after giving birth to her first child (who is now an elite runner herself!). I still have the photo of us together.

Anyhoo, today was completely different, and fantastic in every way. The weather was great, it was quiet (our school has different holidays to UK hols), the kids were interested and the grandparents behaved! My Dad is a complete fountain of knowledge when it comes to life in the 1940s onwards. We all learnt so much from him (as well as the young workers there!) and it was suggested more than once that he could get a job there!

We visited the dentist's house, the garage, the pub, the sweetie shop, (where we bought one or six bags of sweets to share!), the photography shop (which had its grand opening when we were there), the old school (the kids loved it here and we had to go back a couple of times), we went down a coal mine, visited a farm, travelled on trams, buses, played at the funfair and so much more.

It was one of those days which just worked so well as there was something for everyone. I can definitely recommend a visit!