A sad time down South - twice - first day

We had occasion to go to the funeral of Rover 1's Mother.  We did not expect to meet again so soon and definitely not for Betty's funeral.

wide view of town

PJ and I booked a room in Milton Keynes .... the town for the future built in the 60s.  
I was excited to visit this town because, for my sins, I remember this town being built and all the hoohaa that went on in the media.  
Upon arrival it was like stepping backwards in time or was that the future ..... weird.  
All the boulevards are straight, really straight .... and wide, really wide.  

typical 'street'

And the car parks were huge, really huge.   
Nothing like England at all.
We found the hotel quite easily using the GPS on the phone, really boring roads all the same ish.....

our room in the middle of this block

We booked in and then went to find our room ...... there were five houses and we had a room in one of them ....

Not the best but if you were stopping overnight, or just down for a concert - great!  It was one room in the house and, when we went exploring in the morning, we found two showers (one on the top floor and one on the ground floor) and a well fitted kitchen.  I suppose if you are down for a week's work then it is ideal, you could cook your own meal and even sit outside, several of you from the same company would be even better!!!
We carried on to the funeral after booking in, meeting up at the cemetery.
   
The wake was held at The Three Trees in Bletchley, the mourners filling this sitting area and out into the grassed area.  The sun shone and we recalled memories, with the help of a video loop inside, the family members met and parted, and the Rovers piled into cars and went to .... 

... the The Three Locks  - yeah! again!

The sun was still shining so we all sat round the table and talked and laughed .... and talked and laughed ..... then it became a bit cooler so we moved inside and shared a couple of bowls of chips - PJ likes chips!!!!

At the end of the night we all separated and went back to our various hotels, happy thoughts ....