Great British Road Journeys - Cambridgeshire - Wisbech to Ely Ep. 8
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- Опубліковано 29 вер 2024
- #driving #infrastructure #cambridge #cars #roadtrip
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We're back in Cambridgeshire this week for a fun filled episode.. we've got it all going on, trains, train stuff, train crossings and illegal raves. There's some lovely railway stuff too. In a journey that takes us from Wisbech to Ely, we'll enjoy some of Cambridgeshire's very flat countryside through some of the smaller towns and villages that there's little point in visiting. And not a punt in sight.
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.
Sunday isn't Sunday until I've seen Auto Shenanigans.
Have you had a good week?
I have@@MostlyLoveOfMusic
Sunday Fun Day 😂
My break time ritual. Facebook, Auto Shenanigans 😂
Eel day shenanigans
Love Ely - was there on Thursday having travelled on the guided bus from St Ives and Cambridge North
This is the best video I've ever seen about anything
Manningtree is another crossing and underpass rail crossing...
What a nice surprise to see you visited my patch! They used to throw real eels for the Eel festival but it was changed to soft toy eels in recent years. Also, Mepal is pronounced Mee-pol!
Awesome vid mate. It seems your turned the sarcasm up a notch which I indeed do love. With all the crap in the world today I find your videos on the intewebs so refreshing and greatly enjoyable. Say hi to your mum for me from Australia. Some sort of black magic must be happening here. :-)
my ex work mate and his brother cleaned Prison Kitchens and saw Keneth Noye in Whitemoor one night.
Oh mate you were so close to Thorney, you could have dropped in for a cup of tea.
I was born in Wisbech and left when I was 3. No one I’ve ever spoken to in life since has heard of the place 😂😂😂
Low bridges should have overhead gantries with dangly bits well before the approach that provide a pant-sh*tting wake up call to tall vehicle drivers before they can reach a catastrophic fate.
That plastic bag was an unpaid actor 😂
Lovely cameo from Black Bag the faithful border bin liner.
This could be a new feature to rival Geoff Marshall's station bin bag blowing in the breeze.
He was quipping the film Donny Darko
@@Dan23_7 *American Beauty
Coming to an industrial-estate carpark near you, soon!
@@GeneralThargor Viz did that joke in the 1980s, had a whole comic strip ...
“The third disagreement- now upgraded from small to medium” 😂
a bunch of people were not to happy during that period of, plates were in fact thrown
A nice way for him to say hi to his mum; "I'm on the interweb, so you're wondering how I got into your computer". It's things like this that make you fun to watch, Jon
‘Abandoned railways’ could be a series in the future, seeing railways feature more & more. Next week you’ll be presenting from a Peterborough freight train😅😅
Try Paul Whitewick for abandoned railways...
And half the video would be segments where old roads cross the abandoned rail line.
And canals, Roman roads too @@BibTheBoulderTheOriginalOne
@@dave_h_8742Roman roads would be a story all of their own. I know one passed through Hedge End but I'm not able to find any conclusive evidence.
@@dave_h_8742for lost canals @lifeat2.3milesanhour57 is ya man
High-six to all my fenland homies. Fun fact: I once arrived at an accident in the fens where a motorcyclist had ended up in a ditch cos he had hit a potato that had fallen from a farmers trailer. It wrote off his brand new vtr firestorm.
It gives the term "mashed potato" a whole new meaning, or does it?
You'll only get a high-five from me because I wasn't born here. Also, I'll make sure to inform the local bikers about the sugar beet that's been lying on the A1101 roundabout just north of Outwell for the last three weeks. We don't want accidents like that happening again!
I live in Essex ex London, I have several friends from Norfolk/Suffolk, and one of my e-signatures is ......on the other hand, five fingers and a thumb, I also enquire how the scars on their necks are after the removal of the second head
Ah, the land of the extra-wide footwear🤣🤣🤣
"Best jump in the car then, as no-one wants to get the bus". As a Bus Driver myself, I approve this message!
Someone said after a few pints I wouldn't be able to drive my car, so take the bus instead. Turns out I wasn't able to drive that either.
Oliver Cromwell inherited a property in Ely and its now a museum. He was the leader of one side of our own homegrown disagreement.
English Homegrown Disagreement 3 I think? The homegrown disagreements are like Fast and Furious movies, they're not numbered neatly.
@@sIightIybored When is a disagreement not a disagreement though?
@@sIightIyboredcromwell was number 2 ? ..... watt tyler was in at number 1 but then neither bothered to make airports the lazy twats .
@@godzillas6301 I was thinking The Anarchy was No1 and The Wars of the Roses was No2. Making The Civil War No3.
@@sIightIyboredAh well the anarchy was a war betwixt the brits and the bloody french . Yeah it was all a mess with kings owning bits of this and that but it wasnt really something that cropped up in every town so i dont really count that as something on the same lines at the war of the roses . Theres no end of a chance someone was born within this time , grew , spat out 8 kids and died at the ripe old age of 30 all within the time of this conflict and without even knowing about the actions elsewhere .
Theres was the civil war though where it was 40 years of people grumbling with the locals in charge who would vanish in the night just around the time tithes were to be gathered/stolen from the peasents . It came super dooper close to taking out king john and it created democracy that the entire world followed right up until blair got in .........
War of the roses was a legitimite kick off with house by house being against each other based on to whom you answered to and had to point your bow at . To this day if i hear a yorkshire accent i say my mrs is from manchester and are they from lancaster ?. Its a public service and you get great responses .
Cromwells lot doesnt really need saying that is if you dont have a priest hole ....... did the reformation count i wonder ? saying that prick next doors a caff-lick and you are simply fed up with the priests coming and going every sunday night was a sure fire way of gaining new land as a brucie bonus from the local bowel head ...... `enrys in ability to find a productive lady without a face like a bucket of sick is the stuff of legend and when he threw his teddy from the pram over a comly wench it did impact on every house in the land also .... ummmm.... need to think about that one , could it be considered a civil type war ? ... well there was 2 sides killing each other so maybe .
The Thor Missile launching site. There would have been a button specifically for that.
Brilliant
Best comment. We can close the internet now.
Oh my, that level crossing - low bridge combo! 😮
There's a similar one next to Ely Station, though the underpass has more clearance. Since the Ely bypass opened lorries don't need to go anywhere near it.
Makes the 11'8"+8" seem benign.
I just wait for the day when someone causes the railroad tracks to get misaligned causing a notable incident.
@@pgwalling6478when I saw the thumbnail, I thought it would be Ely Bridge.
Too much choice for me.
@@pgwalling6478They closed the level crossing at Ely Station, when they opened the bypass, but many of the bridge strikes there were vans, not lorries, although some still managed it, which as you're sitting at about eye level with the top of bridge does beg a few questions as to the level of attention of the truck drivers involved.
More unsolicited railway trivia: Whitemoor prison is on the site of the former Whitemoor marshalling yard, built in the 1930s, capable of handling 8,000 wagons a day, it was ultramodern technology using a hump that wagons were pushed over then using the speed they picked up they were split into trains to various destinations. The largest of its type in the UK and second largest in Europe it all fell into disuse in the 90s when we stopped manufacturing real things.
I remember there was one of those shunting humps back in the 60's at Dagenham Dock shunting yard where I spent many happy days exploring and watching the London to Tilbury (iirc) trains 😁
I was wondering if that's where the train robbers were kept.
I live a few miles away from Ely, been here nearly 30yrs now. My 1st job was recovery truck driver, the amount of transit type vans we had to drag out from under the bridge was amazing, let all tyres down and drag out. they've got more warnings now but it still doesn't stop people.
Road signs are most helpful in alerting to the danger of a low clearance. However, if one doesn't bother to pay attention to the signs then stupidity ensues. You just can't fix stupid.
@@cbrue1896 gotta agree, stoopid is as stoopid does, was an Hgv driver for years, seen stoopid so many times it's scary
52% voted brexit so additional signs won't work
4:30 the Gratuitous rail content what I'm all here for.
Managing, with that train, to get in some graffiti - priceless.
All that abandoned infrastructure feels like a metaphor for the state of the country!
If it weren't an actual true representation of the state of the country 😢
If Brexit weren't just a blag by persons who want to pick everyone's pockets and dodge taxes more readily we'd be re-industrialising and having infrastructure renewal aplenty. The hollowed out state of this country is a house of cards that is collapsing but we're all pretending is not too bad, really and should stabilise for no apparent reason
The drone is back! Though i did like the run away from camera last week😂
The most twatted bridge in the UK, a great honour.
Chatteris is one of many small towns namechecked by the finest band ever to come from Merseyside, Half Man Half Biscuit.
Not just name-checked, they have a whole song "For What Is Chatteris?" about it, which could have had some road-related fact-checking in this episode. "One way system, smooth and commendable" (Is there?)
"go by bus, they're highly dependable" (seems unlikely based on the rest of the video)
"three good butchers, two fine chandlers,
an indoor pool, a first class cake shop," (a quick Google tells me the pool is still there, at least)
"OFSTED plaudits, envy of the fens,
prick barriers at both ends" (I always thought this meant speed bumps, so would be an important feature to note)
The song ends with the lament that, now that his love has left him he "May as well live in Ely or St Ives" which suggests that neither Ely or St Ives are as nice. But again, citation needed.
home to a infamous criminal family
Ring's End with a straight face. Masterful delivery.
I'm surprised he didn't mention that it's not far from Three Holes!
'The Wilbrahams' or, more formerly 'Grunty Fen' I know which I prefer... 😀
My wife and I looked at buying a house there some years ago until she realised where it was and refused to live in a place with such a name🤣
I only discovered a few weeks ago that it got it's name from the junction of 3 rivers😁
@@kevinmothers904My wife and I looked at buying a house there some years ago until she realised where it was and refused to live in a place with such a name🤣
I only discovered a few weeks ago that it got it's name from the junction of 3 rivers😁
Glad to see the drone is fixed. And the slow metamorphosis into a railway channel. Good job.
Didn't the 11'8 bridge channel update like last week ago after nearly a year of silence? Kinda reminds me of that
Great British Road Journeys is far more exciting then the FA Cup
Anything is more exiting than the FA cup.
@@simontay4851Is that because FA happens?
Actually, as someone who doesn't generally like football, the FA cup seems to be a bit more exciting as it sometimes has David vs Goliath type events.
Some people like exciting team sport and programs about roads too. We think those moaning about one or the other are boring cnuts
@8:08 That's a Short Stirling mate.
You beat me to it!
Let's check in with our friends at RAF Luton.
, @@EmyrDerfel The Stirling has radial engines, (as in the picture) the Lancaster had V12s.
#pedantarycorner 😂
@@harry130747 The Lancaster was available with both Merlin V12 and radial engines. The B.II had Bristol Hercules engines. About 300 of these were built.
I just love the adventure combined with the sarcasm 😂
Could you do a video on the difference between Watford and Watford Gap? I think it would be interesting as many folks believe they're in the same area.
Yes, a definite gap in his portfolio....
Also, Loughborough and Loughborough Junction.
Sorry that pun deserves a groan!@@BibTheBoulderTheOriginalOne
Watford Gap is indeed close to Watford (the village in Northamptonshire, that is).
And the folk who want to visit Leeds Castle so head north to Yorkshire.
1:38 hope you dont mind if i lore dump here but
Toby the tram engine is based on a real tram engine that worked on the Wisbech and Upwell tramway. Specifically a J70 class tram, numbered 68221. The story "Toby and the Stout Gentleman" was based on Rev. Wilbert Awdry (the author of the Railway Series) own experience with 68221.
Correct Rev Awdry was vicar at Emneth at the time along the Tramway route.
Wait that wasn't a joke omg
The uk becoming more and more dystopian
Fun fact: the railway line to Wisbech was open for freight up until the late 1990's or early 2000's
Do we have to guess which one?
@@BibTheBoulderTheOriginalOneYes..... yes, you do 😊
The tracks, except for the level crossings, are still in place but very overgrown.
@@davidrobert2007Price is Right rules?
@@neiloflongbeck5705 Indeed, would be relatively easy to re-open the line from March and ironically this would help with capacity at Cambridge. At the moment a number of trains terminate at Ely (rather than wait at Cambridge) because terminating at Cambridge takes away too much capacity. There are plenty of examples of services that terminate beyond their busiest destination for this reason. Or why we have bay platforms like the new one at Stevenage for the Hertford loop.
As Half Man Half Biscuit once opined:
"For What Is Chatteris?"
"You never hear of folk getting knocked on the bonce, although there was a drive by shouting once" 🎵
Wasn't expecting a rendition of "American Beauty", but I gotta respect the hustle. Your mother should be proud.
Hi Jon's Mum
Ely Eel Day is an example of the English doing odd things because it's traditional ... and if there isn't an odd tradition we will just have to invent one ...
Punts, punts everywhere
Bunch of punts....
They should all go back to Spunthorpe!
British 11foot8
I like this video so I pressed the button specifically for that👉🏻
Ely cathedral is a beautiful place
How the devil are you?
Im fine thanks Andy
For those wondering, Ely is a City; not a town
Visit Soham, little gassy rd, snap a photo of my home. Or Newmarket at the reach track. On May 3rd, I got married at the Council (court house) ( within the rose garden) My nag won the three guanine race that day. I cannot fly but. I’d like to see it. My husband was stationed at RAF Mildenhall and I was stationed at RAF Upper Heyford.
You missed a similar bridge/level crossing combo in Ely which was hit once or twice a week, until they took measures and put in a bypass and large (6ft) electronic warning signs. The day it opened a box van got stuck under it bridge again - thats Ely for you !!
You missed the world heritage dogging site at Mepal, it very popular........ apparently.😶🙄
I still cannot fathom why Taylor Whimpey (🤪) built a mahoosive cathedral in the middle of nowhere. Great video, and series, John. Keep up the good work.
Mother Church and rural landed interests carried a lot of clout back then!
If you think that's the middle of nowhere, try St David's.
Diversifying from the burgers...
I've always wondered why they built Conwy Castle so close to the railway.
@@Graham_Langley how else were they to get all the stone on site?
TIL I've been pronouncing Wisbech wrong.
The irony of getting a correct pronunciation by Jon :)
Just seen that 11'8 channel pop up in my recommended, for the first time ever, a couple of days ago. Now another, much twatted, bridge appears in a channel I watch. COINCIDENCE?
Almost certainly.
Will there be a making a great british road journey like the one you did for secrets of the motorways?
Nice to the see drone is back in working order 👍👍
Wisbech is spelt as Wisbekisan .
Where is he standing at the end?
Kudos for getting Toby in!
Near the railway curve (freight line I think) just north of Ely.
Hi Jon. Watched a couple of series now, Motorways, service stations etc. The two constants that run through all of these productions are:
1. Your great sense of humour and word play and
2. Above all, planners in this country just don't have the first clue about anything. In Yes Prime Minister, 3 articles of Government "Its takes longer to do things quickly, It's more expensive to do things cheaply and more democratic not to tell people they are wasting money.
But what category is Whitemoore Prison in April?😊😊😊
4:32 The 11foot8 bridge got nothing on this bad boy!
Hold on, if Peterborough didn't used to be in Cambridgeshire, how did it end up there?! Is it a bit like people dumping an old mattress out in the countryside in the middle of the night so no one will stop them?!
Fantastic, with appropriate reverence. Didn't realise Thor missiles were kept at Mepal. As for the River Nene, in Northamptonshire it is 'nen', changing to 'neen' at Islip lock, Thrapston, for the remainder of its meanderings into Peterborough, Cambridgeshire and The Wash. Cheers.
Reopen the railway between March and Wisbech for passengers!
3:10 I worked for the railway (on the footplate of diesel freight trains as a Train Driver's Assistant) from 1986, and back then "Whitemoor Prison" was the largest rail freight yard in Europe. So technically I've been in and out of that prison yard dozens of times.
Most crashed bridge, nah, A5 train bridge at Hinckley, no contest.
Luckily I haven't hit it but another driver from our firm did
No mention of the second most twated bridge in England just out side Ely.
I wonder if you’ll get any likes from whitemoor today Jon, 😊
Another great edition.
I'm sad to say that you missed the best thing in Mepal today, the Locust Farm, one of the largest in UK.
The ironic part is they closed the railway line but if it was here today, it would be popular. A large town without railway and the link to the rest of the network is only a few miles away.
They are thinking of reopening the line to Wisbech. It's still there, needs work.
@@JamesHughes65 I remember them saying this for over 25 years now, it'll probably take another 25 years to get it to fruition, yet track bed lies just out side of town and it's only a 12 mile stretch to the main national rail network. Problem is nobody in any position wants to take ownership.
@@dylancarter1831they're doing more surveys and research right now because Ely doesn't want tracks going through even though they literally have a train station -_-
@@theevauwu7853 I thought the track bed runs to March, it could bypass Ely and it literally starts up just outside of the town centre. I suspect for decades they thought it wasn't profitable, but in the last decade alone, Wisbech has seem to of been rebuilding fast and expanding population, a Peterborough to Kings Lynn, via March service could be quite popular.
@@dylancarter1831 It would help with Capacity on the KL line as the daily sand train (For Glass) leaves King's Lynn to go to Ely, then on to Peterborough and then North.
Apparently I was first to like this video.
tHEN ITS YOU WHO BUY THE BEERS !!
ELY EEL DAY! I have my ticket from Virginia USA to come to the UK for that! That's over the bar, John.
A little useless information for you. The Bridge section at 4:43 was featured in a TV show 'Tales of the Unexpected' and I think the episode was called 'Fly Paper' which featured Alfred Burke. FYI 🙂
I suppose it's a good thing there's no good reason to go to wisbech.
I am a former resident of Mepal (pronounced like people) and I can confirm that nothing has ever happened there other than that I married the current Mrs Wells there! Our MP did used to be Clement Freud though!
I later emigrated to Sutton, up t’hill, which thinks very highly of itself and has never quite forgiven the famous airfield for be Mepal Aerodrome and not Surron!
I like Ely! It’s a large mock Georgian market town with a big church and that’s good enough for me!😂. The most exciting thing to happen there since the Normans built the cathedral is the southern bypass that now means less vans hit the Ely railway bridge of the same Ely to Peterborough line.
Peterborough thinks it’s in Cambridgeshire but it isn’t really! Lovely to see my stomping ground achieve international coverage on your show!
PS. Great book about the airfield called Luck and a Lancaster. ❤
Can imagine HM Prison Service might have had concerns about a drone flying near HMP Whitemoor ...
Should I find it concerning that I'm Irish and I've only been to England on 4 occasions yet I still know what Whitemoor is...
Hi Jon. How are you? I'm fine.
You're driving along and you see a gate crossing the road. You stop, get out of your vehicle, a Skyline, and notice a railroad track. You look both ways, open the gate, which opens across the railroad track, get back into your vehicle, a Skyline and drive across the railroad track. You stop your vehicle, a Skyline, get out and close the gate. You get back into your vehicle, a Skyline and drive off.
A mile down the road, you come across a magic roundabout.
Five minutes later, while stopped at a traffic light at another roundabout, gripping your steer wheel tight in your hands, you start screaming.
Drones fixed then? Either that or any increasingly pissed off pigeon on a string.
So I’m guessing the drone wasn’t dead then? Or you had a quick trip to Argos between filming locations?
The 2nd one! :D
The bridge Reminds me of the 11 feet 8 bridge
The railway bridge over the A5 near Hinckley is one of the most (if not *the most*) struck railway bridges in the UK. I would like to know why no drivers are *ever* prosecuted for driving without due care and attention?
It's Cambridgeshire and peterborough check
Pe1- p38 peterborough peterboroughfens peterboroughshire
2:17 What, no innuendo?
9:10 ASMR
I lived in Ely from when I was born to 2017, then in witchford until 2021. I can confirm vehicles always crashed into the bridge. 5 years ago they closed the level crossing and built a bypass around the Tesco area and over the railway.
I have never heard of an Ely eel parade lol
So many abandoned places, such a waste.
Interesting as always Jon.
Thanks for sharing again.
Just to let you know Jon that Ely is a city, not a town. More good looking than most cities many times it's size. There we go. Now for the sarcastic reply from your good self! 😂😂
8:24 "Thor"?!?
Thor is a space-based weapon consisting of large titanium rods (the original thought was railway lines so that's the scale) carrying a camera, basic fins for control & just enough rocket to de-orbit. The idea is that gravity will bring them down & they will have picked & aimed at a target before they melt & will land as a hundred-ton metal raindrop which, with the added kinetic energy, would have the impact of an atomic bomb & destroy anything on the surface for a considerable distance & quite a bit underground.
It's American.
This was the 1959-1963, PGM-17 Thor.
@@tsd550 thanks for the redirect
Ely Cathedral What a beautifal looking building. The English doing English Things comment cracked me up.
An excellent video as always Jon.
Saw those two names pop up and hsd to be the first one here lol, I live in the middle of the two😂interesting to see an outsiders take
Really enjoyed this episode Jon, especially the most twatted bridge!
At least they have the excel bus route from Peterborough to Norwich service Wisbech, Kings Lynn and Dereham. I do think there are recent talks about reopening the Wisbech railway.
I'll be damned if that bag floating in the wind wasn't a Family Guy reference. Respect.
I was thinking more League of Gentlemen...
Eh?!?
American Beauty.
Possibly been referenced in FG since 🤷🏿♀️
It's an American Beauty reference :D FG probably did it too.
Peterborough is a unitary authority and not part of Cambridgeshire except for policing and ceremonial activities.
Yes, that's absolutely right, in the same way that Swindon is in Wiltshire except it isn't!
@@MatthewBrannigan correct
I love that Ely is pronounced correctly over there. We have an Ely in Minnesota US and too many people call it Ee-Lie. Just makes you want to slap them with a Walleye.
What is it with Americans & mispronunciations! It's Iraq not Eye-raq. Ditto for Iran. AluminiUm. And as for the Welsh towns in Pennsylvania, they just get butchered!
Sadly it happens in the UK too. Many times I've had delivery drivers or companies call it Ee-lie.
I don't know whether anyone else has mentioned this, but at 8.09, that's a Short Stirling, not a Lancaster!
Grrrrr.... you beat me to it! 😂 But to satisfy my nerdy honour, I'll point out that's a Mk.3 Stirling (oil coolers under the engines).
@@robertlangham9028 `I'd never have known that! Stirlings had very long undercarriage legs compared to the Lanc and Halifax.
Yes that bridge is low , but the one at shoreham airport can match if not be lower , puts the willys up me when i go under it on my motor bike " HEADS UP "
That bridge reminds me youtuber "yovo68" and their 11'- 8" bridge cam has some satisfying roof scraping. Short and sweet and worth a silly look.
That LOW BRIDGE/Neon chevrons signage had me doubting if I could successfully get under it and I drive a small hatchback! Lol