Spies and Old Friends

Yesterday’s beautiful weather has turned. The forecast for the rest of our London stop looks pretty cool.

First up today we got ourselves to Euston station and on a train to Bletchley Park. This is where the British ran their code breaking operation during the second world war. It was where Alan Turing and his team broke the enigma code that the Germans used during the war. In doing so they effectively built the first significant computer. Recently made famous by the film The Imitation Game.

The complex is the original homestead and grounds as well as the numerous buildings the code breakers used. Another beautiful place. It is amazing that they had up to 9000 people at one stage working in the area and they were able to maintain the secret. The estate is really well set up and fascinating. A real mixture of science, maths, linguistics and heaps of human stories. They were definitely a different group of people, but they did some amazing things and certainly shortened the war. Again, we ran out of time and could have spent several more hours there.

At the station the rains came for the first time on our trip.

Back into the city we met up with Dennis and Pat who are long-term friends of Uncle Graham and Aunty Lynda from when they were doing their OE many years ago. RB had stayed with then when they

were all over a couple of years ago. They came to Balham to meet us and we had a very enjoyable dinner at a local pub. Mike had been in Scotland for the day and joined us later in the evening when he got back. Many stories told.