Saturday 28th March 2026

Time then, for a road trip.

And the weather was to be bright, sunny and fairly warm. Until the early afternoon, where at our destination, there was a chance of showers.

Chance.

Showers.

With 150 miles to drive, it was up at five, feed the cats and make coffee. Check on traffic and the weather. Again.

Before setting off at ten past six.

First stop was Tesco to top up the tank, which thanks to the Orange Man Baby costs now £1.50 a litre and will only go higher.

Back onto the A2 to cruise up to the bottom of the motorway, then into Faversham, to pick up my old friend, Andy, as he was to be my travel buddy.

I had to wait a while for him to be ready, I was fifteen minutes early, after all.

Then he jumped in, and we turned onto to the motorway to head north.

Traffic light going north, but busier going south towards Dover. We'll worry about that in the afternoon when we come back.

But for now we were making good time to Gravesend, then onto the M25 and down into the Dartford Tunnel under the river and into the badlands of south Essex.

We had loads of time, so cruise round to the M11 turn off, then round the cloverleaf and back north towards Stanstead.

Amazing how light traffic was, and was lighter once we passed the airport and motored into Cambridgeshire then onto Newmarket and so into Suffolk.

We stopped for breakfast at the services on the A14: sausage rolls and a brew at Greggs.

We had half an hour to go to our destination, and nearly three hours to kill.

So, what to do?

I had mentioned the viewing area at RAF Lakenheath, so we turned north to Barton Mills, then on the Brandon road until we came to the USAF base, which is a little bit of the US in Suffolk.

It seems the fence has been upgraded, and I'm pretty sure there was numberplate recognition cameras around, but we were just going to see if there were any planes to see.

Once we arrived at the viewing point, there were dozens of cars already there, most people had cameras with huge lenses and stepladders so to see further, though still through the fence.

A large military vehicle kept watch on the small crowd. We parked up and wandered about. Some had air band scanners, but the lack of action meant we quickly got bored, so we went back to the car and drove to a nearby village to see what there was to see.

Mildenhall is a large market village, with old houses and a huge parish church.

After driving round the small one-way system one and a half times, we parked in Sainsbury's, where we had two hours free parking.

Andy has his targets, and me mine. So we would meet back at the car at twenty past ten, I strode off towards the church, only to find it didn't open until ten.

So, I walked round the village, took some shots, just to fill the time.

There are plenty of small shops and takeaways, though few customers at half nine even on a Saturday morning, but clearly enough trade to keep them in business.

The modern arcade near the bus station is bland to say the least, but again most units had tenants, and there were a few folks around.

I walked back to the church at five to ten, met up with Andy outside, and so we both found the door to the large porch open.

A warden was inside, though friendly enough, didn't like my suggestion I could walk into the sanctuary of the south chapel to photograph the large memorial on the south wall.

It was a bit frosty after that, though no amount of frost could cool my love of the roofs of the Nave and two Aisles. Carved with angels in the Nave, and hammerbeams with carved figures in each aisle. All wonderful work. I wish I had the big lens, but this would have to do.

We had forty minutes before we had to be at Barham, so we walked back tot he car, used the facilities, and drove the twenty minutes over the other side of the A11, up the dead end part of the old road, through Elvington, now returned to tranquillity now the traffic passes by a field away, before turning right over the fields past flocks of black fleece sheep to the old base, now a small industrial estate with businesses having taken over the old military buildings.

We were here for a guided tour, along with about twenty others from around the country. So we checked in, and Andy went to climb the watch tower. Having climbed them in my youth in the RAF, I passed.

RAF Barnham was the maintenance unit where the UK's first generation of ballistic nuclear bombs were built and maintained.

Blue Danube, a 15 kiloton weapon, as some 7.3m long and weighed 10,000 pounds. Inside were the fissile material, and the accelerator that started the chain reaction after the core had been compressed by high explosives.

The accelerator had a short half-life, so had to be replaced, hence the need for third line maintenance here.

On the site are the prep buildings, storage buildings (hutches) for the cores, as well as messes, barracks, a fire station, MT depot and offices.

At eleven, the tour began. First with a potted history by the son of the couple who bought the site from the MOD in the sixties for twenty grand. To grow mushrooms.

That failed within three years, but parts of the site were leased out as storage and industrial units, and so the base was preserved.

Mostly.

The tour proper began, walking round the entire outside of the site in the end, and into a couple of the buildings, while more of the history was explained.

There are over 50 of the "hutches" where the fissile cores were stored, some have been preserved, many have not.

After about an hour, the sky darkened, and soon the wind picked up and we had to deal with hail and then heavy rain.

We tightened our coats, and the tour continued, as we explored the rest of the site, ending with the storage building for the complete weapons.

It was twenty to two. We were both hungry, and a search of the CAMRA website for a real ale pub took us 12 miles to Freckenham to the Golden Boar pub.

Only one other table was in use, so we had the pick of the remainder, and chose one beside the window which looked out onto a small courtyard.

Soon, two long-tailed tits came to the window, hung from the frame and looked in, each with beaks stuffed with feathers for their nest. Such cute bundles of joy.

The food, when it came was excellent. Burger for me, and hunter's chicken for Andy. Sadly, there was no ale on, and certainly no chance of there being Adnams, which CAMRA had promised us.

We ate our meals, Andy paid, then we returned to the car for the long drive home.

Back to the A11, then onto the motorway and into Essex.

Traffic was heavy, but not too bad. So I cruised at sixty, and while we talked, the car ate the miles up.

Onto the M25, gaps between junctions that took ages to bridge, passed in mere blinks of an eye.

Over the bridge and back into Kent. We turned down the A2, cruising again at sixty for the last thirty miles over the Medway and back to Faversham where I dropped Andy off on the old Roman Road/A2.

Just left me to get back to the A2, then drive back past Canterbury to Whitfield and home. Getting back at twenty to seven.

No dinner for me. But Jools had cheesy and onion rolls, though we both had brews, then a beer/cider as the last sunset of winter time played out away to the west.

I was pooped, so we went to bed just after eight, with no football, there was no distraction, and soon the Sandman took me from this world.