Day 21 - Bletchley Park

This is not a hostel I will return to.  Remember how I said hot water was essential.  Well, they don't turn on the boilers here until after 7, so this is a fail in the morning.  They do have washing machines, so I wash all Jeri and my clothes including the jeans knowing that we will be here three nights so there is plenty of time for them to dry.  I get up at 6 to shower, have a cup of coffee and head out to get breakfast for the students.  As I said, cold shower.  Plus, Jeri has decided to wash her hair and I keep trying to tell her it is a bad choice.  From there, I dress (not in the jeans which haven't dried) and walk to the market for bread, coffee, milk, etc.  I get a neat looking coffee contraption that is a cup with a coffee filter built in and you pour hot water in at the top and it filters coffee down into the cup.  It doesn't work as well as expected, and as I am moving it to the sink so that I don't make a mess, I pour boiling water all over my left hand.  Meanwhile, one of my students who has gotten up to complain about what I didn't get for breakfast starts joking around in the kitchen.  I loose my cool and tell her now is not really a good time and could she please knock it off.  I spent the next hour running cold water over my and and eating breakfast one-handed.  However, I did finally get that coffee.
We had to leave at 8 to take the tube to the Euston Station to catch the train to Bletchley.  We get there just on time.  Fortunately, the Park is literally only meters from the train station.  We start out with a great talk from a retired mathematician about the mathematics behind the Enigma machine.  He then takes us on a tour of the grounds and tells us stories about the people who lived there and the problems they faced.  We got to see the re-built Bombe machines (for finding the day key for Enigma) and the re-built Colossus (for finding the day key for Lorenz).  After the tour we had lunch and Alyssa gave us her report on Turing.  From there, I toured the computing museum, reading a lot that I had been told about that morning.  There is also a second floor of exhibits about life in WW II which I found very moving.  From the point of view of the British, the outcome of WW II was very much in doubt.

We took the train back to Euston Station and, since it was now rush hour, agreed to meet at 6 to find a place to eat.  Jeri and I had a quick coffee, chocolate and muffin. wandered around looking for a poundland and exploring the area and finally met up with the students for dinner at a fusion cuisine restaurant.  I put another 5 pounds on the students' oyster cards and returned to the hostel.  I showered that evening while there was hot water.