We have had a pretty busy summer, which we will report on soon, but the big news here at Victoria’s Torton Tales is that a couple of our crew members have got engaged…
Jack and Alice, who crew on Albert most of the time but are also seen on our other engines, have got engaged. Jack proposed to Alice while out on the road with Albert, and Alice had no idea it was going to happen!
Jack (Wendy’s son) and Alice have been together for 7 years, so they know each other very well. Last year they bought their first house together, so this was the next thing, I guess.
Back in August we were making plans to road Albert to an event from Amberley Museum to The British Engineerium in Hove; Jack really wanted to road, which is a distance of about 30 miles, a fair way on Albert. We had said we would put Albert on a lorry for the trip, but Jack was adamant he wanted to road him, now we know why!
Plans were being made by Jack, and now his parents, Wendy and Lloyd, were in on it, and of course Jack went and spoke to Alice’s mum, also called Wendy, and along with Alice’s friend, Katie, the plan was coming together.
It was an early start on Sunday 18th October, up at 4.30am to put a fire in Albert and get on the road. By 8am they were ready, with just a few last jobs to do; fill up with water, and they were off out the gates to Amberley. Now, to set the scene for the day, Wendy had said to Alice, “We will make sure we take plenty of pictures on the trip, so let’s start with one at Amberley.”
And off they went, Albert going well, apart from his chimney trying to full off but it was soon fixed, onto the first stop about 7 miles in; it had been very hilly and just wanted to top Albert up with water and get another of those pictures of them both on the journey!
Onto the next stop and by now a few friends had turned up, including Wendy (Alice’s Mum) and Katie. We had even managed to come up with a plan to get them there without Alice wondering why they had come along, so Alice didn’t suspect why both her Mum and Katie were there, in fact we were so clever Alice had arranged it all but little did she know we had it all planned too!!
Soon we were heading to the seafront where Jack had planned to drop his surprise. We found a space to park Albert and his trailer in a nice position with the sea in the background and it was a lovely sunny day. We did the “Come on, let’s have another picture of you both in front of Albert.” Then Jack got on one knee and pop the question. Alice had no idea and was so surprised, she even said “What are you doing” before she realised what was happening, and yes she said “Yes!”.
It was lovely, with all their family there and the cheers and tears were flowing. But before long they were back on Albert and carrying on with their trip, Alice was steering through tears for the rest of the journey. They finally arrived at the British Engineerium at about 4pm and they could finally take stock of what had just happened.
We wish Jack and Alice the biggest congratulations on your engagement and for your future together.
