After a very cold night we woke
up to the coldest morning we have had since leaving Melbourne. The cloud had
lifted leaving clear skies and extremely chilly winds. It was nice to have a
decent shower today in showers that didn’t have a timer on them and there were
lovely and clean as well as being quite modern. We even had a visit from the camp mascot that had followed Michael back from the toilet block just after breakfast, she was very cute, however a little timid.
We left our camp at 9am and drove
about 30 minutes to our first destination of Cadbury World. Our GPS played up a
number of times on this trip and we ended up following the huge tourist signs
which ensured we ended up in the right place. Having been to the Cadbury
Factory in Tasmania, I was interested to see how different this tour would be
as this was the birth place of Cadbury and Bourneville. The exhibition is
devoted to the fascinating story of chocolate and how it came to be regarded as
one of the world’s greatest pleasures. It has become one of Birmingham’s
largest attractions and currently features 14 zones which tell the story of chocolate
and the Cadbury business through various static set’s animatronics, video
presentations, multi-sensory cinema, interactive displays and demonstrations
and staff demonstrations. Cadbury began in 1824 by John Cadbury who sold
coffee, tea, drinking chocolate and cocoa as an alternative to alcohol as he
thought this was the main cause of poverty. His sons took on his business when
he left and they expanded it over time to become a hugely successful business
in chocolate. The brothers were of extremely moral and family oriented stock
and extremely concerned for the welfare of their employees so they built up the
Bourneville village adding parks and recreation areas and encouraged their
employees to participate in all sports that would help with the health and
fitness and general wellbeing. This was all when times were hard and money was
short, and they ended up with very loyal employees.
It was so informative that we
both thoroughly enjoyed it. It was so much more than just a tour through a
chocolate factory where you were given a few free samples of chocolate! The
tour ended up in the gift shop and it was here that, yes, you could buy any
Cadbury chocolate you could think of! We headed straight into the Café and had
a salad Baguette and a hot chocolate for lunch. The amount of people who had
arrived now for their tours had increased significantly, so it was great timing
that we departed at about 1pm.
We headed off though the Village
of Bourneville which was really delightful, in sharp contrast to the rest of Birmingham
– quite an industrial type of place.
Our next destination was the Museum of the
Jewellery Quarter. This was established to depict the history and traditions of
the renowned jewellery manufacturing tradition of Birmingham. It is located in
an actual former jewellery manufacturing workshop which is where our next tour
took place.
When the owners of Smith &
Pepper decided to cease operations in 1981 after being in operation since 1899
they were unable to sell their business. So they removed their valuables and
locked the door leaving behind all the everyday items used in their business,
metal dies on the shelves, receipts on their hooks and ledgers in the safe.
Tools were strewn about, grubby overalls were hung on the coat hooks, unwashed
teacups abandoned; even jars and marmite were forgotten on a shelf. In the
history of the company the equipment and procedures used to create the gold
items changed little over the years. We were given demonstrations on how a
Smith & Pepper bangle was fashioned at the jeweller’s bench, the methods
used to bore a hole in metal with a Archimedes bore drill and stamp out a
medallion using a giant press. This was a truly inspirational experience –
stepping into what is a time capsule of a jewellery making operation!
When we had finished this tour,
we wandered back through the streets lined with Jewellery stores all offering
beautiful pieces of jewellery for sale, along with other interesting things to see also.
We headed back to our vehicle and drove
through the streets of Birmingham which are really quite unattractive.
We had plans to have dinner at
the Golf course located just next to the caravan park; however on investigation
we found it was closed for a private function tonight, so we had to made do
with whatever we had in our fridge! Michael cooked up his version of French
toast – our Sally Lunn’s bun, sliced and coated in egg and cheese then fried up
in a pan. It was absolutely delicious – much better than going out.
We have
turned the gas heating on tonight given that it is going to be yet another cold
night and as it would appear, it works very well! We are toasty warm and cosy
in our ‘home away from home’. Early night tonight as we are off to York
tomorrow.
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