Military History Tours          On Tour - RAAF in the UK 2 July 2011

Today was a day of flexibility for our group.

The plan was to go straight to Zeals to view the Spitfire field that was used in the war then on to Sutton Veny and then Middle Wallop.

We did some of the plan but as the day wore on we kept expandiong the port folio.

On the way to Zeals we visited the ancestral home of John Hobbs in a small village called Tefford Evias. What a wonderful village with a miniture Salisbury cathedral, a huge Manor House and Rose Cottage. Rose Cottage is the old family home and Colonel Fleeton took John to the cottage and decided that he should have the opportunity to speak to some person who may be inside. Upon entering the yard the ower of the cottage, Annette Keating, was in the garden picking flowers to take to the Church.

John stayed with her and was invited in to the house. Some photos of all in the script can be found below.

From there it was a wonderful visit to Zeals where the owner of the site, Kevin Obrien, took us into his home and with a cuppa in hand we were able to stand on the vehranda around the control tower to overlook the grass strip.

An original tower and an original grass strip, what more could we expect.

We then moved a couple of Kilometres to a site in the bush after a long walk, where we found the memorial to a crashed Dakota that had 28 on board including 2 Australian Flying Officers The crash was in February 1945 and caused due to mist in the area. We had a small service before trudging back to our coach.

Moving on to the Army Aviation Museum at Middle Wallop saw us spend the next few hours viewing this wonderul Museum.

Tomorrow, Yeovilton Museum and Sutton Veny.