On Saturday 14th September 2019, the sun shone as 50 bell ringers and friends departed for our autumn coach outing to the Bedford area.
At our first stop, Toddington, we joined the local coffee morning before ringing their bells to the tunes of Stedman Triples and Yorkshire Major.
Moving on to Husborne Crawley, the bells were again quite heavy and the high ceiling made them challenging to ring. Courses of Bob Major and Grandsire Triples were successfully achieved.
Our buffet lunch at Bromham Water Mill was gratefully received and non-ringers had extended time to eat and drink whilst the ringers went off to perform at nearby Biddenham. The tower at Biddenham was accessed by climbing an outside staircase over part of the church roof (see photo below.)
At Bedford (St Paul’s) we had the opportunity to ring on a musical set of 12 bells and managed to sound Call Changes on 12 and Plain Hunt on 11. Inside the church, non-ringers visited the Wesley Pulpit where John Wesley preached the Assize Sermon in 1758 on the theme ‘We shall all stand before the judgement seat of Christ’
Our final ring at Cardington was on a heavy but musical set of 8 bells and we enjoyed some of our best ringing of the day. This was followed by a carvery dinner and our return to Hornchurch.
Our thanks go to John Church for such a well organised and enjoyable day!
