Valerie and Norman stayed with us over the weekend.  We met up at the National Trust property, Hughenden Manor home of Benjamin Disraeli in High Wycombe for lunch and then a tour of the property.  As well as being the home of  Benjamin Disraeli, the house had been requisitioned during the second world war and was used to produce target maps for the night time bombers of Germany.  We were taken for a a very informative tour and talk about the map making which occurred during WWII on Hughenden Manor.  Like Bletchley Park, those who had worked here, kept quiet about their work, telling no one.  This map making at  Hughenden Manor  only came to light in 2004, when an elderly visitor was heard to say that his desk had been in the corner by the window during the war.  His conversation was overheard by a NT room monitor.  It took another year before the visitor had been released from the official secrets act and could divulge what had happened on the site. The National Trust has now put together quite an impressive exhibition about the people who made the maps for the night time raids of Germany.  The maps were hand drawn from reconnaissance photographs of the the target areas, printed, and then sent over to Bomber Command nearby at Naphill.

We had a lovely day at the Manor, even lazing on the deck chairs on the lawn in the late afternoon sun.

On Sunday we visited Gallows bridge BBOWT nature reserve.  The birds took the hint and did a disappearing trick, except for some 20+ Geese.