Our first winter ride out coincided, as it usually does, with remembrance Sunday, This typically means that the ride lead tries to time the ride so that part way through the first half, nearing 11am, we are able to safely stop at an appropriate spot for 2 minutes silence. Sometimes, as happened this ride, things go wrong to go right. We were late starting off and therefore the original plan had to be scrapped, but at 10:50am we passed a poppy wreath laying ceremony be prepared at the entrance to RAF Spanhoe.
RAF Spanhoe Opened in 1943, it was used by both the Royal Air Force and United States Army Air Forces. During the war it was used primarily as a transport airfield. After the war it was closed in late 1945. Today, much of the airfield has been returned to agriculture, however one runway remains and the airfield is currently active and houses various privately owned light aircraft.
We joined about 50 people, a few smartly dressed dignitaries and an RAF Air Vice Marshall to listen to the poems, and stand silent with our thoughts before, during and after the playing of the last post, by a lone, uniformed, lady trumpeter.
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them.
We left about 15 minutes late, mainly due to the fact that the members of the ride were deeply engrossed in their own conversations, and this after all is a social ride and not a military campaign. We made our way along some well-known and not so well-known roads (and one narrow lane with grass growing through the tarmac for the GS riders among us) to RAF Spanhoe. After our stop of about 20 minutes, we continued to Café Nevil (https://www.nevillarms.co.uk/cafe) at Medbourne for a late breakfast / early lunch. We cashed in a £100 voucher than the Café had issued following a problem on a previous visit, and it has to be said that the food was delicious, very high quality, and the service was fast and friendly.
A couple of the group decided to go directly home from the Café, and the rest of the group enjoyed another 1.25 hour trip back to Wansford, in slightly damper weather, where we said our farewells.
