So as it's Harry's birthday on Friday I thought it best that I finally write about Charles'.
We booked him the day off from preschool to have a family day out. We had a few ideas of where we wanted to go and decided on a trip on the steam train in North Norfolk. Thankfully we checked first as there was a diesel weekend on therefore, no steam trains! Argh!
We looked all around the local area and surrounding counties but nothing was as good as the North Norfolk trains so we decided to forget the train idea and go with something else.
A week before Charles' birthday the boys dad came in from work excited at something he had just discovered. A railway museum in York had the Flying Scotsman in for refurbishment. This was the first Brio train Charles had, kindly given by Father Christmas.
I phoned the museum to check the Flying Scotsman would be there when we planned to visit and they couldn't have been anymore helpful. She told me about parking (£9 in their carpark although we found somewhere next to it for £7.50 for 24 hours!), about activities for children, the turntable and so on. And so we decided to go for it.
We wanted to keep it as a surprise from Charles. We booked a Premier Inn and stayed over on the Thursday night, collecting Charles from preschool and hitting the road straight away.
We told him in the car that we were going to a hotel, and in all honesty he would've been happy with that as his present, he was really excited!
We arrived at the Premier Inn at 8.15 and headed straight for dinner where I told him that we were going to see the trains we had been watching on YouTube. He was really excited.
The boys were up at around 7 the following day and Charles set about immediately opening his birthday presents and cards.
We took our time getting ready and having breakfast and then went to the museum.
Parking was a bit odd. We couldn't work out where the museums car park was so we parked somewhere else, although it was right next door, and less money than the museums car park.
The museum is free but they encourage donations.
The museum was amazing. I didn't realise before just how beautiful old trains are. I won't be boring and write about the different trains we saw but if I ever get the chance to go on a Mallard, I totally would!
The royal carriages were also breathtaking.
The boys absolutely loved the museum, as did I. We would definitely return again.
I think the highlight for us all was when we got to see a train go round on a turntable. Charles was in his element I think.
There's a land train which goes into the City so we took advantage of this at lunchtime and headed to ASKItalian for a birthday lunch. We're glad we did this as we fell in love with York and hopefully will visit next year for longer than 2 days.
Alternatively there is a cafe at the museum which sells a variety of foods. We had a Latte, Mocha, Hot Chocolate and Babyccino.
It was a really brilliant day. One of those days that you miss when you return home and really treasure.
