Military History Tours          On Tour - RAAF in the UK 11 July 2011

This will be the last input for the RAAF Tour 2011. The tour in 2012 will be renamed as Bomber Command and the RAAF in the UK. This was because the preponderence of interest by those attending seems to be associated with Bomber Command. We do however visit the airfields from where our fighters flew as part of the Battle of Britain.

We left Bedford at 0900 for our run down to London and our visit to the Hendon Museum. This would be our last official activity and once we concluded our visit we would move into our hotel in London for one last night and in the morning of the following day those on tour, who had shared many adventures together, moving moments together and from that, friendship, would go on our separate ways.

This tour has been very special indeed. We have visited airfields from where members on tour had had a family member operating from there, Churches with memorials to Australians lost in the War, Museums that detailed stories associated with the Squadrons that had our men serving in them and local people who were remembering those days or who wanted to show their support to this tour as it remembered those who were lost all those years ago.

Hendon is a very fine Museum to be the place where this tour concludes. Each and every year when I return, I find that the Museum has yet again improved and is presenting another display of historical correctness.

We moved to our hotel and proposed that we would meet at a local pub that evening for a concluding tour dinner. All met at 1800, moved to the hotel and enjoyed a wonderful dinner and a few drinks.

Tomorrow following breakfast, the tour ends.