Great British Road Journeys - Berkshire - Slough to Reading Ep. 28
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- Опубліковано 10 вер 2024
- #berkshire #driving #roadtrip
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This week we head over to Berkshire, home to some of the finest towns in the land, such as Slough and Reading. Great. We'll be making various stops along our journey to take in the various sights and sounds such as Bracknells abandoned ski centre. We'll also look at a roundabout, a library, a victorian prison and we go in search of some biscuits.
Using a copy of the 1923 Michelin Guide, I'll be travelling the country to see what remains and what's changed since it's publication. The guide offers suggestions on thing to see and where to stay all with the goal of getting you out there and exploring in your motor vehicle.
Reading AND Slough?
Give this man a bravery award.
And Bracknell 😮
@@gryff8400 "When a man is tired of Bracknell he has been there 20 mins"
-a BBC Radio 4 comedy, possibly Concrete Cow
And Banksy! Now we'll expect Banksy to make a portrait related to this video.
My office is in Reading and my customer office where I spend a fair amount of time is in Slough. Do people actually stop in Bracknell rather than just pass through it? Last time I stopped there must have been in the 1990s, red traffic lights aside.
I'm just surprised he survived Slough.
Reading University's best contribution to society is equation E = M4². E being the total energy it takes to get out of Reading.
😂😂😂
I moved out of Reading 30 years ago but there are a hell of a lot worse places to live.
@@redmille1000 As someone from Aldershot, I can confirm
Reading University also has the equation L=iN/c0LN/biS/cUiTS, found by the scientists Huntley and Palmer as the highest degree of boredom that any foodstuff can produce.
@@terrynixon2758Christ, I studied in Reading and have lived in Bracknell and Aldershot. Also Leeds. Can confirm
Huntley and Palmers in Reading is where the custard cream was invented
Huh - rumour has it they were totally wiped out at the Battle of Lidl Cream Horn . . .
Matey lives there too
@@peterthebricky The bubble bath?
Most important place in the world, then! (and I'm NOT being sarcastic)!
United Biscuits have a lot to answer for.
This must be the only video that features Reading Gaol and doesn't mention Oscar Wilde. Well done.
He's much too young...
That's a good point, and earnestly made too
The only thing worse than talking about Oscar Wilde is not talking about Oscar Wilde.
Or Rock Hudson
Slough (where I used to live), Bracknell (where I work) and Reading (where I live now) all in one video! Cheers John! Have a coffee on me 🫡
You didn't happen to be Hitler in a previous life and are now suffering the payback this time around?
Better luck in your next life...
Calling at Wokingham, Winnersh, Earley and Reading... 🤭
@@paulsengupta971Reading isn't bad actually. It was a lot worse 25 years ago. Improving, unlike Slough.
@@ARCANEmateCLAN Yes, at least it isn't the gun crime capital of the UK any more. I don't think. It's where my office is.
Thanks John - as entertaining as ever. A couple of fun facts - Gerry Anderson, of Thunderbirds fame, set up facilities in a warehouse on Slough trading estate for producing Supermarionation films and one of Reading Gaol's most famous 'residents' was Oscar Wilde.
Kind of surprising that Century 21 didn't even get a passing mention - for a while, in the mid-60's, they were the largest purchaser outside Hollywood of 35mm colour movie film.
Or infamous residents.
The Ballad of Reading Gaol
Poem by Oscar Wilde
Two definitions of the word "slough"...
-a hole full of mud or wet soil, such as one in a road.
-a condition of degradation, despair, or helplessness.
I don't need to add anything else.
perhaps better than being called grimsby.
Except in those meanings, the word is pronounced 'slew'.
@@eddiewillers1 "Ackchewally..."
@@eddiewillers1 Hmm? In what language?
Years ago, one of the "Welcome to Slough" signs was graffiti embellished with "Twinned with Chernobyl"... Says it all.
"But are these roundabouts any good?" "No, not really" Jon sums it up so succinctly!
I have a friend who used to be a long distance coach driver. On a trip from Swansea to London he was diverted off the M4 into Slough. While sitting in the ineveitable Bath Road traffic jam, he treated his captive audience to a recitation of Betjeman's famous poem.
That's the one referring to the hopeful demise of Slough by some 3rd party actor during disagreement 2?
Sir John Betjeman’s poem, written in 1937 and simply entitled Slough, criticized the construction of more than 800 factories in the Thames Valley… “Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough! It isn’t fit for humans now.”
@@mb-3fazetime travel must be a thing then. As someone else said, it wasn't about the town, but the trading estate which he visited in the late 1920s, then it was literally a farm converted into an absolute post apocalyptic looking mess with little purpose.
@@ForeverNeverwhere1 Yeah - the time-line with the small disagreement, blitz, poem etc don't really match. I wonder what bombs Sir John was referring to?
" not so much a luxury resort , but as a last resort" 👍😁🤣🤣🤣
I'm sorry you had to get within 50miles of Slough for us, but thank you
I reckon there's about 20million people living within 50miles of Slough...
@@abarratt8869we should pray for those 20 million people.
Yes, we really appreciate the sacrifices you make for us, Jon!
Reading is indeed famed for it's seed. My great grandfather's notebooks on seed growing and marketing are kept at Reading university.
Sutton’s?
@@chriswalford4161 Related to King’s
Having grown up in Reading, the Bracknell ski centre was my closest ice rink growing up, so I went there occasionally for friends' birthdays and whatnot, I have fond memories of it.
I didn't know it had closed. Suddenly hearing it referred to as an "abandoned ski slope" was very jarring!
Yes, i think when John Nike pulled out the whole thing went downhill (no pun intended).
Same here! I didn’t realise it closed! Such a shame…
I skated there for about 10 years, too. The place was losing money (apparently quite common for ice rinks) and you could see it - it was falling apart. Then along came COVID lockdowns and that sealed the deal, it was financially unviable. Losing £250k a year and needing about £650k in maintenance isn't a great recipe. A great shame, really. The replacement rink up the road is much smaller. Demolished in June/July 2022. Still rubble a few weeks ago, but due to be a new warehouse by Q4 2024....
Think it was massively in debt so had to close. Took a while for it to be demolished but the ice rink is now a pile of rubble and only remnants of the ski slope remain.
I remember going there a handful of times as a kid in the late 80s / early 90s.. I still remember the smell of the place! A mixture of heavily salted (and curiously sugary) chips and slush puppies from the cafe, aging plastic crowd seating all around, rubber mats all over the floors for the skates, locker room funk and breeze block walls. Unforgettable!! 😆
You missed out Winnersh between Wokingham and Reading.
We have houses and... erm... a train station...
And a triangle. Don't forget the triangle.
What about Lower Earley - or Legoland as it was affectionately known....?
Two of them in fact: Winnersh, and Winnersh Triangle
Woodley and Earley
@@steve.b.23 ..and a Microsoft
Summed up Slough very nicely. The only good thing there is the Mars factory because it emits an amazingly sweet smell.
You tire of it after a decade or two…
Thanks John. But no mention of Gerry Anderson’s AP Films during your Slough visit. As creators of such masterpieces as Thunderbirds and Captain Scarlet I’d have thought that was one thing (probably the only thing) to the town’s credit! 😢
Their early work was done in Maidenhead; the move to Slough Trading Estate came a bit later, although you're not wrong. A lot of the development work was done in a pub in Cookham, where Arthur became the basis for Parker and his "unique" style of speech was born!
And I ended up driving Sylvia Anderson in her final years with some marvellous conversations and reminisces for us both about those wonderful productions....
4:03 An interesting fact about the construction of the Maidenhead Railway Bridge is that to appease the local community Brunel agreed to place some supporting structures underneath the arches, slowly removing them until the bridge was shown to be stable. However being Brunel he put the supporting structures together deliberately to the wrong measurements, there was always a gap of a few millimetres between the structures and the arches, meaning they were always stable anyway, and Brunel got one back against the town.
The Guildhall in Windsor is the same. It was designed by Christopher Wren, but when they saw the plans the councillors didn't believe the design would support the first floor, and so they insisted he had to put in some pillars to hold it up. He put them in, but they actually stop an inch short of the first floor.
And were you aware that the bridge is locally known as the Sounding Arch? Because it's over water, the echoes are absolutely magnificent. It entertained me as a schoolboy umpteen years ago, entertained my children, and gave me a good story for my taxi customers for 30yrs.
I did not know the Bracknell ski centre had closed. I learned to ski there. It 'starred' in the 2015 film 'Eddie the Eagle'.
I learned to ski there too. Wikipedia says it opened in 1985, but I'm sure I was falling over there somewhere around 82/83.
skiied there many times. Like you, never knew it had closed - what has happened to all those skiiers?
came to the comments to make the very same lament - late 80s pre-alps school ski trips were always prefaced by trips to the Bracknell Alps (far better than Aldershit ski slope). I guess the rise of the indoor snowdomes at Hemel and Milton Keynes have greater allure and someone has no doubt made a lot of money on a property deal for the old site
An Ali G impersonator did a video saying to 'save the John Nike centre', it was bloody hilarious
@@Stealth360stealth Ali G (Sasha Baron Cohen) started his career on Bracknell Cable.
You missed the listed hexagonal tower block (Point Royal) in Bracknell - 60's concrete at its best!
Berkshire used to have a large area of land north west of Reading until the boundary changes 'swapped' it for Slough!
Love your dry humour Jon!
Point Royal, or the 'threepenny building', was designed by architects Arup Associates, who I believe also worked on the Sydney Opera House and the Birds Nest Stadium in Beijing
I'm from a pre New Town local family, grew up in Bracknell, and moved to Wokingham when I left home. Thanks for reminding me why I now live in West Wales, close to a town very much like Bracknell was before it was demolished!
…..in an eco hamlet?
to be honest Bracknell is much nicer these days, they've spent millions on the town centre and its far nicer than Reading to get in and out of
@@Stealth360stealth Does anyone actually stop in Bracknell rather than just pass through?
Reading Abbey is right by the gaol and worth a visit to note the old est recordest notated music or something like that.
I guess it wasn't mentioned in the guide book. As you say, well worth a visit even if there isn't really much of it left.
Yes John - A lot of history at the Abbey and at Fry's Island. Fry's Island is famous as the location of a trial by combat between Robert de Montfort and Henry of Essex, the standard bearer to King Henry II.
Wokingham is the home of the National Grid control centre, quite an important establishment I would have thought. I believe its exact location is kept quiet.
It's on the road between Barkham and Winnersh. Just along from Reddam House.
Not really that secret. Its down Bearwood Road and is called St Catherines Lodge.
@@amazulu3401 Oh, is THAT what that place is?! Never knew that. Was always suspicious it was some kind of black site or at least somewhere you don't wanna f with.
it's literally called that on a map, so certainly not top secret. Is a nice area though
The population of wokingham spend their days commuting to work outside of the borough, it’s 99% houses 1% business.
I commute into it for work
Only about 8 miles, but it's a commute.
A number of BA pilots live there. A lot better than living in Hounslow or Slough.
A reservation on the outskirts of Reading.
Slough Trading Estate is where Mars Bars are made and where Gerry Anderson produced 'Thunderbirds' etc.....
And Citroen had a factory there
And the first Williams F1 factory I think....🤔
And the home of Lola racing cars, especially the underpinnings of the first GT40
Like some of the comments below, I too grew up in Bracknell and Wokingham and it was a great place to live and work. Back in the early Eighties there were well paid jobs to be had around the Western Industrial Estate with the likes of Ferranti, Sperry, Racal and other military electronic's companies. Then the Berlin Wall came down and we all became 'Big Mates' with the Russians and such companies where deemed not necessary any more... Look how that's turned out. Today Bracknell and Wokingham have just become dormitory towns with no such proper industry and with relative easy access to the M4/M3 corridors, most people just work elsewhere. Great series Jon, keep up the good work.
Spot on about Wokingham.
It used to be an interesting place as a kid.. but bit by bit, swimming pools were bulldozed for housing, the central green space used for monster truck rallies and fun fairs was turned into a crappy swimming pool, futuristic looking (for the early 80s) buildings fell into disrepair and were bulldozed for housing, lots of industry and manufacturing buildings were left to ruin and demolished for housing, fun and unique sporting and leisure venues were bulldozed for housing, carparks and blander leisure venues...
I miss Hacienda That (the Mexican themed restaurant in the Phoenix Plaza (before First Bowl).
I've watched every one of this series and even as a Northerner only 2 mins into the episode, this is easily the best one!😂
Bracknell now joins up to Wokingham thanks to the development at the old Transport Research Laboratory. Locals assume it will be renamed soon - to Brackingham. Or Wokenell.
To the east it's becoming Brascot with for example "Mercedes-Benz of Ascot" (in Bracknell).
That development joins it with Crowthorne, it was already joined with Wokingham by the developments near the hotel in the video.
It’ll all soon be the Central Berkshire Metroplex
The South Wales valleys have always been like that. The towns/villages all merge into each other, with only a sign to separate one from the next.
The ski-slope material (6m:40s) is called "Dendix", colloquially known as toothbrush. Brilliant for dislocating or fracturing thumbs (from personal experience).
These artificial ski slopes don't have much staying power do they. The old one in Sheffield has a knack of catching fire on a regular basis.
@@antonycharnock2993 My old stomping ground,Hillend (Edinburgh), still going !
Every birthday party I went to there always had some poor kid dislocating something 🤷♂️
@@antonycharnock2993I’m glad someone else said that, so I didn’t have to.
Just gets better and better....really slick and fast-paced this week...a weekly treat; cheers John, wicked sweet awesome.
As a Wokingham resident I can agree that it’s not very exciting apart from the 11 pubs and umpteen coffee shops. All in all nice place. You didn’t mention the Mars factory in slough but that’s understandable if you needed to wrap up and leave asap.
Went to university at Reading 25 years ago. A grim place.
Auto shenanigans at its finest. You did forget the Mars Bar factory and the fact that Citroens were built in Slough.
When I’ve finished with Slough, there’s Reading, Aldershot, Bracknell. Didcot, Yateley. You know. Winnersh. Taplow. Because I am my own boss. Burghfield.
Stayed in coppid beach a few months back. So strange as it's got multiple bars and clubs. The room was huge but super dated but had a balcony with spectacular views of the petrol station.
Since watching The Shining as a kid, this place always reminded me of the Overlook Hotel! Never stayed there but worked in the bar and "nightclub" glass collecting when I was 15. They didn't know I was 15 to be fair. 😅
Re Slough Trading Estate, it was in Edinburgh Avenue that the Thunderbirds TV series was filmed. I used to work 4 doors up the road and never knew! It was also the location of the opening shots of "The Office".
I live in Wokingham (Woosehill) and I can tell you we go everywhere except Wokingham because all there is is coffee shops and charity shops. If you want to do something decent, head to Bracknell or Reading. And yes that does show how poor Woky is when we call Bracknell ‘decent’
Great video. But you missed of a lot of great info of the towns you visit. Wokingham for example, an old market town, Bracknell was the brickyard that build parliament and also housed Kathryn of Aragon, Reading Goal housed Oscar Wilde and was built on the graveyard of Reading Abbey, a place a king was buried.
John you are right about Wokingham, we live there and the most notable thing is the length of the Post Office queue.
Hi John, thank you for yet another entertaining video. There was a time, before 1974, when the county of Berkshire was a lot taller. It went up as far as the western side of Oxford, and Abingdon, home of the MG (until 1986?). The end of my address was Abingdon, Berkshire and in the Abingdon Borough Council area.
A lot changed, not for the better, when Abingdon became part of Oxfordshire and lost its Borough status. Abingdon has been rebranded as Abingdon-on-Thames, and during flooding becomes Abingdon-in-Thames aided by the River Ock. Best wishes from I think you can guess.
And part of Wokingham used to be an exclave of Oxfordshire.
Thanks for the history lesson about the hotel in Bracknell. I have a nephew who live near there and wondered why someone would build a fake Alpine Lodge there, but the artificial ski slope answered that question.
It's featured in several films and TV series including the film Loch Ness where they pretended it was in Scotland!
That's the Overlooked Hotel.
You found two interesting things to say about Reading and both of them have closed down.
As someone who grew up in Reading, you've got it about right.
I lived in Reading for a few years but managed to escape.
But Is It Art used to sell a postcard of the sights of Reading, featuring an empty and dusty IDR, dilapidated RG1s, old bus station and the old prison wall. I picked a few of them up that day!
The best things about Reading is the road out of it
That is *literally* how flats in Reading are advertised. "Move to Reading for great transport links to London!" Not kidding.
Not wrong, either.
If you can find it - the only town with ring road in the town centre rather than around it and, yes, i am a Reading - well, Woodley - boy
Wokingham has a nice Gail’s. So there’s that
I live just outside Wokingham and I have no f***ing clue what they do either! :D Its a nice little town though and they tend not to riot very much. The worst thing you could say about Wokingham is that they kept electing John Redwood to parliament until very recently.
The infamous poem is in fact a rant about the trading estate, and the rapid industrialisation of post-war England. Slough was also the location of the first zebra crossing in 1951, which was designed at the Road Research Laboratory in Langley during 1946, and would have been located in the now pedestrianised High Street, close to Boots.
Great video. You missed a trick with the railway bridge in Maidenhead. It is known locally as the Sounding Arches as you get a fantastic echo if you stand underneath it and shout.
If you had turned off the A329 between Wokingham and Reading you could have visited Woodley and what remains of the old aerodrome there. It's all houses now but was where Douglas Bader had a slight disagreement with the ground in his aeroplane.
Musme of Berkshire Aviation is still there though
I grew up in Farnborough, another jewel of the commuter belt. Having the same name as the trainer company old Johnny N, convinced 1000's of kids that the 'john nike leisure centre' was actually something to do with the NIKE, INC. In the era of Air Jordans we all flocked there expecting some form of U.S.A grandiose experience... The reality was bracknell in the 90s...
Some of the film Bugsy Malone was filmed at the old Huntley and Palmers biscuit factory and the Sean Connery film The Offence was filmed around Bracknell.
You could have called in at Woodley, formerly home to Miles aircraft factory - the last remaining trace of which has sadly recently been demolished 😢
With a cracking free aviation museum
Jon, that was excellent for the industrial archaeology and the fun. That library at the beginning was wonderful. I never knew it existed. I didn't know Wokingham existed either, but since it doesn't seem to, that's alright.
Wokingham, during WW2, had a fire station of retained firefighters. My Great-uncle Fred was the driver. They could be called out anywhere in Berkshire or Hampshire, even down to Southampton Docks, in the dark, during blackout. As a result, he could find his way about the county, technically blindfold.
However, when returning to home, they were "required" to report to Reading Fire Station to be formally "stood down". For some reason he could never explain, Fred could never find the road into Reading, and always ended up phoning Reading from Wokingham that they were safely home.
OMG! I’ve just noticed that the junction number on your intro equals the episode number! Neat 😁
At least 2x lols before 1:00. Another quality production.
I'm quite disappointed that you visited the Slough Trading Estate and didn't mention The Office.
I have, on several occasions, driven one of these little yellow and blue buses in and out of Slough Bus Station and EVERY TIME that tune popped into my head. I'm so glad it was a good one.
One of the best parts of my job was leaving Slough behind for another day, and Reading for that matter.
I was born in Slough. My dad had a building company in Ledgers Road, and he built many houses in Wokingham. My grandfather started a bus route number 81 from Slouh to Uxbridge
The no. 81 still runs, but from Slough to Hounslow. I'm not sure why...
The poem about slough in The Office, which was set there, is hilarious.
That's brilliant! I know a funny story, too.
One of the Slough estates steam locomotives runs at Middleton railway leeds
I can't wait the episodes when you visit Devon and Cornwall.
That bit at 6:26, the ski slope. In the late 1990's I used to work out of the Hewlett-Packard HQ which used to be in the background next door to this ski slope.
It was all built on reclaimed land with loads of Methane dispensers spinning around. It was a 1hr40 min slog from Portsmouth and back each day. 😞
The place was called Amen Corner, I never found out why.
I grew up there and still no idea. There is a T junction near where I live in Leeds called Amen Corner, and that appears to be after a church being there
That HP site is now an AWS datacenter!
I lived in a place called Newell Green which is technically a hamlet outside Bracknell........ now it is almost swallowed up in the increasing conurbation that is Bracknell. This place spreads quicker than the flu.
Thank you for going to Slough so we don't have to. And Reading.
I live in Bracknell and even I don't go to Slough.
My office is in Reading but I hardly ever go there. My customer office, where I do go, is in Slough.
Been past Slough and Reading and I don’t mind Slough and Reading is just like any other town & city with high rise buildings.
I lived in Bracknell for almost 20 years, left in 2002. Only been back a couple of times since. Never, ever missed the place.
You have a good aim then?
I once had a go on that ski slope when someone held a kids party there and my daughters went along. It was horrible, burns and broken thumbs if you fall over. Also Wokingham is or was home to Microsoft UK, so that explains the massive growth in nerds in the area.
I bet the locals in all these places with massively increased populations are really delighted about that.
better tell them all to stop having children then.
@@Andy-fd5fg You think they'd listen?
@@AntonHu probably not... but if they don't then they can't really complain about the place being "over populated"
@@Andy-fd5fg The 10s of thousands of new houses were not built for locals.
As a former resident, can confirm that you’re not wrong about Wokingham.
The last public execution at Reading gaol was in 1868 (?). 1913 was Reading gaol's last execution, but it wasn't public.
Good stuff, as ever.
Thanks.
You misheard there. John says last execution in 1913
"It was deliberately laid out to keep prisoners isolated from one another, and the area out front would have been used for public executions, the last of which occured in 1913."
Ah Reading, the first of three Universities that I have attended at one time or another as I collected my various degrees. You were talking about Reading Gaol, which of course notoriously housed Oscar Wilde at one point, inspiring him to write "The Ballard of Reading Gaol". Meanwhile behind you the flint built church is Greyfriars the last remnant of an ancient Franciscan Friary. There is actually quite a lot to see and do in Reading, but then I am probably biased. Sadly Studying Physics, which was my reason for being there in the late 70's is no longer one of the activities that is possible as the JJ Thompson lab closed in the late 2000's. Anyway great video nostalgia - thank you.
Worked at the Ski Slope for a number of years in its peak .. what a blast from the past
Wokingham is a near London commuter town - famous for manufacture of Bells, which would be in the guide book - should have been to Bell foundry lane - they made some famous Bells.
As someone that lived in Maidenhead for six years, I can tell you, it's one of those places that isn't particularly amazing, but way better than its reputation suggests. Reading is similar.
Slough, though? Exactly as bad as you'd think.
I reckon that the weather in Reading is generally better than anywhere else in the UK.😊
A little more than 40 years ago I flew from the US to the UK to set up a new manufacturing line at our sister company in Slough.
There I was introduced to British hospitality (airport gaol), cuisine (sugared beer, full English), and, of course, Slough.
Good times indeed.
Hey !, you're in the Langley Massive !.................welcome, leave as you find ☺
Lola racing car company were on the Slough Trading Estate. They designed and built many very successful racing cars there including the Ford GT40. Production of that moved to Ford Advanced Vehicles also on the Estate. (Mars Bars too were made on the Estate!)
You could possibly be standing near Henry I's grave at the end in the prison car park, or on it.
6:15 the town centre was regenerated in the Mid 2010s not 1990s, it opened in 2017.
Princess Square was the 1990s regeneration, leaving the town centre a wasteland which needed the Lexicon to revive it in 2017. In between was the Peel Centre which also did its bit to pull trade away from the centre.
I believe the regeneration was announced in the 1990s, but somehow it took over 20 years for them to actually regenerate the town centre
Gutted you didn’t demonstrate the brilliant echo that is produced when standing under Brunei’s bridge!
Great video as always!
That's an odd place to print newspapers.
I grew up Reading and lived in lots of places since. Love going back
Callback to the very friendly horse! Excellent! Now I have to watch that video too... Thanks Jon, have a great week. 👍
I love your subtle humour, like standing in the weeds in possibly worst corner of Bracknell (there are many to choose) next to what i call the Mordor car park.
Fun fact, 2CVs were built in the Slough trading estate.
shorts and winter cap ... perfect 🧐🤭😉😁😂🤣
Interesting that you didn’t swing by Windsor from where Berkshire is correctly called the Royal County of Berkshire. Good vid though.
The original Ford GT40s were built on Slough Trading Estate. I also think at one point both Ferrari and Citroen had their UK HQs there as well.
Love "Field" being marked on the map from Maidenhead Bridge to Bracknell and the friendly horse reference!
Jon you missed a top fact that the Thunderbirds TV series was filmed on the Slough Trading Estate. It's also home to Mars confectionery and was where Ford Advanced Vehicles was based where they manufactured the Ford GT40 racing car. Lola Cars was also based on the trading estate (the Lola Mk6 GT was the progenitor of the GT40).
I stayed in Slough for two years whilst working in maidenhead. Now I stay in Bracknell whilst working in Wokingham.
What everyone does in Wokingham is "The National Grid". It's all balanced from there.
So you work in the nicer places and live in the dumps? Most people I know would choose the opposite!
@@paulsengupta971 hotels. Thankfully now one day a week. Curry house Bombay Story in Wokingham is an absolute gem.
I grew up in Bracknell and this video sums the place up nicely. I spent every moment I had from the age of 12 getting out of the place and moved to Cambridge as soon as I could...
Oscar Wilde's best known play features a Lady Bracknell. Maybe he wrote it when in Reading Gaol (The Importance of Being Earnest)
Old Reading Gail was a right goer after a couple of shandy’s
I use to use that ski slope back in the, er, 80's or 90's?!
I mean I know the channel is AUTOshenanigans but you went to the Maidenhead railway bridge and didn't play at the Sounding Arch?? :(
Came here to say this. Every time I drive past the bridge it takes a will of steel not to park up, dash down and yell under the sounding arch.
The roundabout outside Reading Gaol is known as "The Bollard of Reading Gaol".
Never heard Reading, Bracknell and Slough described as delights.
Hotel and ski centre were on episode 2 of pie in the sky. Nebditch International Hotel and Conference centree
Reading museum has a stitch for stich replica of the Bayeux tapestry, which in a lot of ways is better than the original because it isnt so old and fragile so is displayed in a more accessible way
Reading University sounds like a nightmare for anyone who doesn’t like books
A pity that Jon didn't take the time to visit Binfield, which is a lovely village just outside of Bracknell, and where I used to live. It has quite a lot of interesting history about it, as Alexander Pope (the poet) used to live there between 1700 - 1715. Also, the local football team Binfield FC, in 2021 reached the final of the FA Vase at Wembley, and in doing so became only the second Berkshire football team to achieve this feat.
Something I learnt today from your production is the closure of Reading Prison. Selling off the land might have been a mistake….
I think one of the major alterations in Reading recently has been the railway layout alterations, including the station. Alright, it doesn’t really fit with road journeys, but it provides a rapid way out, and can handle more freight to/from various places.