But only for an hour!

However, with help from the enthusiastic team of volunteers I managed to fill the hour between 3.30pm and 4.30pm last Sunday without leaving Hull Paragon Station (as we knew it in my student days in the 1970s).

The City has had a changing programme of events throughout the year and I was lucky to catch a day full back in August.

I had just completed the first leg of my journey to Amsterdam by train from home to Hull and had allowed an hour’s leeway before catching the bus from the station to the ferry port where I was about to board the Pride of Hull (certainly the biggest ferry I’ve ever sailed on).

The advice was to :

Look up at Jason

“A full-size model of the aircraft used by the first woman to fly solo from Britain to Australia has gone on public display.
Inmates of Hull Prison created the Gipsy Moth plane over a six-month period as part of the Hull City of Culture 2017 programme.
Amy Johnson, who was born in Hull in 1903, flew the original plane from London to Darwin in 19 days in 1930.
The model has gone on display at the city’s Paragon railway station. The replica bears the name Jason and the G-AAAH letters of the original de Havilland Gipsy Moth.
The original plane remains on display in the Science Museum, London. 

Following her record-breaking flight, Amy Johnson joined the Air Transport Auxiliary flying aircraft from factories to RAF airbases during World War Two.
She died in mysterious circumstances when her plane crashed in to the Thames estuary in January 1941. Her body was never found.” [source]

Watch and listen to William Wilberforce :

“William Wilberforce, the politician who helped abolish slavery, has been brought back to life in a series of virtual reality films.
Wilberforce’s campaigning led to the passing of the Slave Trade Act of 1807, which ended Britain’s involvement in the transatlantic slave trade.
To mark the 210th anniversary of the law, a 3D figure of the Hull-born abolitionist will appear in four films.
The videos will be shown around Hull as part of the city’s year of culture.”

Watch them here. I would also recommend the 2007 film Amazing Grace:

“In 18th-century England, House of Commons member William Wilberforce (Ioan Gruffudd) and his close friend and a future prime minister, William Pitt (Benedict Cumberbatch), begin a lengthy battle to abolish Great Britain’s slave trade. Though Wilberforce’s legislation is soundly defeated in 1791, his growing affection for Barbara Spooner (Romola Garai) inspires him to take up the fight once more.”

Look around you at the birds :

Fly to Freedom : Over 100 mosaic birds wing their beautiful way around the station concourse walls. They have been made by professional mosaic artists and community groups from Hull.