Walking from home to the local Heritage Centre (which is mostly about railways, unsurprisingly) I passed this vibrant and aspirational mural... to be a place that is accepting, vibrant, inviting and friendly seem a good aim for a small town that has been bruised over and over again with demise of its core industries.

I had a fun day - far more fun than I anticipated when I first arrived onsite and the absence of clear signage was a little off-putting.  Being able to explore old trains and learn about how different types of signal boxes function was interesting and engaging.  The volunteers were well informed and interesting to listen to, and there was plenty of hands on stuff for anyone who wanted it.

I did feel they had missed a trick with the pop-up cafe (I understand the permanent one is closed for refurbishment) which really should have been called 'The Shop in Coach C' given the similarity between what it sold and what Avanti (and previously Virgin) sell in theirs... mind you, the heritage centre was a good deal cheaper!

This weekend was a World War II themed event with an interesting exhibition, including maps showing where bombs had landed in Crewe - some just a street away from where I now live (and explaining why there is a significant area of new-build housing in a Victorian street)  and a photo of someone who had lived a few doors down from where I do who was standing next to a train when it was hit... a real shudder moment.

Unlike yesterday's visit to a professionally curated, university-linked museum, this was a low-budget volunteer-run enterprise.  One actively seeks to decolonise its global heritage, the other seeks to tell the story of its own context.  And both 'work', showing that whilst there is no one 'right' way to be a museum, if stories can be told engagingly and honestly, then visitors can have fun and learn/discover new information and ideas to help shape their thinking and living.