Industrial Revolution, sightseeing tour of historic sites

TENTATIVE ITINERARY	NIGHTSTOP
DAY ONE
Arrival in London where you’ll be met by your Back-Roads Touring Co. Ltd guide-companion. This will be one of our specialist team who has a particular knowledge of industrial and economic history. Assuming that most tour participants will arrive before lunch, we’ll try to maximise on the remainder of the day available by visiting a couple of site close to our London accommodation. Of particular interest will be the Brentford Steam Museum with the best collection of pumping engines in the world. Tonight, you’ll enjoy a welcome dinner at a pub beside ancient River Thames wharf buildings where the river meets the Grand Union Canal.	London

DAY TWO
Leaving London, we drive west. Our first major stop of the day is at Swindon where, as befits a major hub in the Victorian rail network, there’s an excellent railway museum. Then on to Bristol to focus this afternoon on another form of essential transport, sea vessels. Some argue that Bristol merchant venturers were directly responsible for the industrial age as their money was invested in developing iron for trade with West African slavers. Whatever the case, the city is a fascinating one and highlights here will most definitely include Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s first iron steamship, the SS Great Britain, a host of other maritime industrial relics, and the Clifton Suspension Bridge.	Bristol or South Wales

DAY THREE
Across the River Severn lies South Wales. Wales powered the industrial revolution with its bunker coal. It was also here that some of the great early iron foundaries were established. We’ll explore the Rhonda Valleys and go down a coal mine. There’s also the superb St Fagan’s Folk Museum where 40 acres of park is filled with rebuilt historic buildings including a water powered woollen mill.	Bristol or South Wales

DAY FOUR
Leaving our base early, we drive north to the very cradle of the Industrial Revolution, Iron Bridge Gorge and nearby Coalbook. We’re going to spend the entire day here, seeing the world’s first iron bridge, visiting Blist’s Hill a recreated Victorian town, the Museum of Iron, the Coalport China Museum and Jackfield Tile and Decorative Ceramics Museum.	West Midlands

DAY FIVE
Still in the heart of the Black Country, we visit another superb Victorian recreation, this time to see amongst other things, the famed Newcomen’s engine – the world’s first steam engine. We’ll also be taking a canal barge ride and begin to learn something about the incredible transport system that the locked in waterways of the canals provided.	West Midlands

DAY SIX
It’s hard to believe as we drive through the breathtaking mountain scenery of Wales Snowdonia region, that we’re going to see something industrial. But, high in the mountains we discover the fantastic slate caverns and quarries that this are was once famed for. We’ll be descending into to slate mine to experience what life was like for our forebears. We’ll also be taking a steam train ride through the mountains and visiting Caernarfon, once the largest slate exporting port in the world and still dominated by its 12th century fairy-tale Norman castle.	North Wales

DAY SEVEN
Some industrialists were enlightened men, building model villages for their workers - Lord Leverhulme was one such and we’ll see his Port Sunlight settlement . Next, will be a piece of canal engineering to beat all others, the remarkable vertical, Anderton boat lift . We complete today with a visit to two mills, the Quarry Bank Mill at Styal and the paradise Silk Mill at Macclesfield.	Cheshire or Manchester

DAY EIGHT
Today we spend a remarkable day in Greater Manchester. We’ll tour this great city (where both the causes of free trade and communism were developed – Karl Marx wrote his Communist Manifesto here). Then to nearby Bolton to see Crompton’s ‘spinning jenny at, Hall i’th Wood. Finally to Salford and the L S Lowry gallery. Perhaps, more than any other person, this artist captured life in an industrial town in his famed ‘match-stick men’ pictures.	Cheshire or Manchester

DAY NINE
Heading north, our first stop is at George Orwell’s famed Wigan Pier. Here we’ll perhaps witness the workings of a great steam driven wheel and hear the deafening roar of the cotton machines. Then to via Lancaster to the open-air museum at Beamish. This has won many awards, including the best museum of the year. Finally, if there’s time, we’ll tour a Yorkshire dales lead mine.	Durham

DAY TEN
Darlington can justifiably claim to have been the birth of the steam train. The first passenger railway opened here in 1825. Here we’ll visit the marvellous North Station Museum and see Stevenson’s ‘Locomotion’. Next is the model village of Saltaire, with its mills and workers’ terraced homes. And while we’re in Bradford we’ll visit the Industrial Museum that tells the story of wool, upon which this town’s Victorian fortunes were based.	Derbyshire

DAY ELEVEN
We’re back in the midlands of England, now the East Midlands. It was here, in Cromford, that Richard Arkwright developed his revolutionary ‘water frame’ spinning machine. We’ll visit Arkwright’s Masson Mill (perhaps the best example of the ‘dark , satanic mills’ ). Then, later the Crich tramway museum. We’ll also see Belper’s mill (reputedly the world’s first, and the city of Derby, including Crown Derby and some very interesting architecture of the industrial age.	Derbyshire

DAY TWELVE
Our day today focuses on pottery and we drive across the Peak national Park to Stoke on Trent. Here, we’ll see the bottle kiln of the Gladstone Pottery, and Josiah Wedgwood’s ‘Etruria’.	Derbyshire

DAY THIRTEEN
We return to London via the freeway but, en route, our final site visit is to a memory of an early age of transport, the Waterways Museum at Stoke Bruerne. Here you’ll board a canal barge, see examples of canal art, hear about life on board and also walk to the entrance of the Blisworth tunnel. It was a mile long, and without a bridal path for the horses that towed the barges, had to be ‘walked’ by the barge. We arrive back into London early evening. Tonight, you’ll have free time to pack or perhaps to enjoy a last night in London.	London

DAY FOURTEEN
From the age of steam to the age of the jet. Today is ‘going home’ day and we’ll transfer you to the airport , unless you’re perhaps staying up explore the capital city and its fascinating industrial past.