Bletchley Park

I’ve wanted to visit the war-time code breakers camp at Bletchley Park in Milton Keynes for a long time, and the opportunity for a visit came at the end of our Holiday fortnight this year. (By the way one thing which impressed me is that the entrance ticket gives you access to the site for a whole year with as many visits as you want. That contrasts very well with a lot of ‘attractions’ which are £50 or more for one visit).

The visit started with a half hour talk in the Library which told the story of Bletchley Park, and then had a walk around tour of the site, lead by one of the Bletchley park guides.

As we walked round the site we were told the story in detail of the war time efforts which lead to the British breaking the German enigma codes, enabling the British to read German secret message almost as soon as they were transmitted. It’s a fascinating story and it’s really brought to life with a visit.

As well as the wartime code breaking center, the Bletchley Park site also houses the British Computer museum where we saw the rebuilt colossus computer. I found several of the computers I have used over the last 30 years – an Atari 400, a Commodore Pet as well as some large main frame computers like the PDP 11.

James and Emma found the trip a bit boring, but they found the playground with the picnic area,  climbing frame and large chess set more interesting, so in the end it was a trip we could all enjoy.

The rest of the pictures I took are available in a Flickr set on my flickr photostream.