Reflection and remembrance

At last we have made it to the National Memorial Arboretum nr Lichfield in Staffordshire. It's a place we have earmarked for a visit en route to or from my daughter's in Bristlol for over a year and we've never managed to fit it in.

We left after Gertrude (the latest UK storm) had thrown its worst at us and travelled down to the a Midlands in bright sun arriving about lunch time.

Unfortunately the Armed Forces Memorial was undergoing renovations but we had a good walk around about half of the park in dry weather. It was very moving to see the many memorials and we particularly made for the Bastion and Basra walls. These have the names of those lost most recently in the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts. Our son was involved in op Herrick in Afghanistan in the winter of 2010/11, he is in the Royal Engineers.

This man made watercourse forms a semi circle in the centre of the park where the Basra and Bastion walls stand and each willow tree is a memorial to a soldier lost in those conflicts and the very first one we saw, as well as the reflected memorial bench, was for Private Chris Kershaw who was from Bradford. As I said it was a very emotional experience, not least visiting the 'Shot at Dawn' memorial to those shot for desertion in the First World War, all now pardoned thank fully.

We will return in the autumn as the new visitor centre will be open then and the renovations to the main Armed Forces Memorial will be completed.

We hit more wet weather as we headed south but the news of 100mph winds in the northern Isles is very scary. Hope everyone up there is safe. Have a good weekend everyone. We hope to here in Bristol.