Since the trip to Edinburgh, we have used two cottages and ticked off several items on the bucket list. [EDIT] This post I started weeks ago, and since we have been so busy, I eventually managed to post.
Milton Keynes
While traveling to our first cottage, we decided to split this journey up by staying in Milton Keynes. We had two nights in the Hilton Doubletree, which is built into the Milton Keynes Dons football (Soccer) stadium. My sister Julie was accompanying us for the first week. We both had a room overlooking the football pitch, which was interesting watching the grounds maintenance. Unfortunately, there was no match being played while we were there.
Two items were ticked off my bucket list in Milton Keynes.
- Bletchley Park – Home of the code breakers.
- The National Museum of Computing. The location of the world’s first computer room.
Bletchley Park
Bletchley Park was the center of code-breaking in the UK during World War 2. You may have heard of the Enigma machine. This is where its codes were broken, known as the Intelligence Factory. The visit took about 4+ hours and was enjoyable, engaging, and educational. My understanding of the Bombe computer was pretty poor until I visited the National Museum of Computing.
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National Museum of Computing
The museum building — Block H — was the first purpose-built computer centre in the world, hosting six Colossus computers by the end of World War II.
After an excellent presentation on the Bombe machine by one of the experts at the museum, I understand a lot more.
After leaving the Royal Navy in 1980, I worked at ICL. I was trained on ICLs 2900 systems and peripherals. I remember working on a 2988 super-dual computer. This was a beast.
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