Go With Joe

20/07/2023

So this why I've not been doing online tours since Heygo went under. I am a professional in-real-life tour guide, and needed real income. So I threw everything at the real world and left the virtual one behind. And what have I got? An unjustified hate campaign and journalists adding a T into my surname!

Heygo Voyagers Virtual Friends

Well, let's be honest. Did not think a page would be needed. So much of the business is tourists, so not people who you would expect to form a long-term relationship, which is the way a page is meant to work. But it seems there is a need to put down a dated record of events, because of what happened today. It wasn't the first stepping stone, but it is the point at which everything that follows leaps off from. Just wish they'd gave spelled my name right. Though the extra T is a new twist for me.

But anyway......

10/04/2023

Well, that's that then!

To anyone who has been watching my livestreams on Heygo for the last year, this is sort of where to find me in the future...

09/04/2023

For months I have been saying that Morris Dancing season starts now and I will start to cover it on my Heygo tours. Well, I would hate to break a promise and I finally had it confirmed earlier where there will be some tomorrow. Sorry about the time, not much I can do about that. I'll throw some Stratford-upon-Avon in too as that's where it's happening. Starts 11am BST. No idea how long it will take!

Book this live-streaming tour with Joe right now on Heygo.

13/02/2023

Big thanks to everyone on my tours over the last couple of days. I thought I'd share this image right from the end of today's tour of Abbey Fields, showing the sun setting over Kenilworth Castle.

I'll be back next week in Worcester!

12/02/2023

Three tours today- all new! Alcester, Droitwich and Droitwich again! Join me at 2, 4, & 6 GMT here

28/01/2023

Sunday, William Shakespeare, cradle to grave. Pretty straightforward, starting where he was born, ending where he is buried! And Evesham Abbey earlier in the day too...

https://www.heygo.com/tours/william-shakespeare-cradle-to-grave?utm_source=tour_share_link&utm_content=14788

17/01/2023

Here's the video from the Hinckley Bullockers Plough Tour last week.

Although on a Saturday, the Hinckley Bullockers perform the traditional 'Plough Monday' Tour, dressing the plough and taking it on a Morris dancing pub-crawl...

07/01/2023

Here's a short clip from the Hinckley Bullockers Plough Tour earlier today. I'll be starting the afternoon session at 3.15. https://www.heygo.com/tours/the-hinckley-bullockers-plough-tour

04/01/2023

I've edited down my tour with Shakespeare Morris on New Year's Day, basically I've cut me out!! If you like what you see, be sure to sign up for my two tours with the Hinckley Bullockers at 11am and 3.15 GMT on Saturday.

Shakespeare Morris dancing at the New Inn, Clifford Chambers, on the 1st of January 2023. This video was originally broadcast on a live stream at www.heygo.c...

03/01/2023

Today at 6pm GMT I will be doing an as live tour from Canons Ashby House, a former English Stately Home which is now a National Trust property. It is on the site of a former monastery, and there is still a good bit of that to see there too. Like a lot of National Trust houses, it is in the middle of nowhere so there is no sign of any signal there. As such this is going to be the first of (as yet) three as live tours I will be doing at the same time for the next couple of weeks, the other two being Baddersley Clinton and Packwood House.

Book this live-streaming tour with Joe right now on Heygo.

17/12/2022

I will be live at Kenilworth Castle soon for the carols service. You can find the songs via this link: https://kenilworthlionsclub.co.uk/carols/

Tour here https://www.heygo.com/tours/carols-at-the-castle

Book this live-streaming tour with Joe right now on Heygo.

13/12/2022

Just about to go live....

https://www.heygo.com/tours/christmas-tractor-run

12/12/2022

I've got my first 'as live' tours today. Two of them at English Stately homes - I'm doing two together and repeating them next week as they've both been decorated for Christmas, but I now have another three scheduled for the new year too.

https://www.heygo.com/john-bull

07/12/2022

Something which came up at the Coventry Guides meeting last night, should I start using my real name for my profile?

When I started on Heygo, I thought more people knew what "John Bull" meant. Although more of an everyman than an authority figure, he's best described as the British version of Uncle Sam.

But people don't seem to know that, not just across the world but here in Britain too as it is a bygone icon who was always second fiddle to Britannia.

So should I be just 'Joe', or no?

06/12/2022

So tonight you'll get to ask a bunch of guides questions after we've already been in the pub for an hour and a half. I'm sure everything will be fine.....

Book this live-streaming tour with Adam’s Crime Through Time right now on Heygo.

04/12/2022

If you want to sing along with the carols at the end of my tour of the Leamington Lantern Parade which is coming up very soon, there is a song sheet here (and yes, I know it says 2018, but it's the active link for today too!):http://www.leamingtonlanternparade.co.uk/identity-cms/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Lantern-Procession-Carol-Words-2018-002.pdf

Tour link:
https://www.heygo.com/tours/royal-leamington-spa-lantern-parade

Book this live-streaming tour with John Bull Tours right now on Heygo.

26/11/2022

Big thanks to everyone who joined me on Thursday night, and especially those who stuck with me for over three hours for the whole thing at the Warwick Victorian Evening. The most amazing thing was that I think it could have been four hours and I still wouldn't have covered it all! I missed the fire performer, there was at least one more choir and I didn't get anywhere near doing all the stalls.

I am still very annoyed at not winning "Best Dressed Victorian" though!

24/11/2022

Just about to start this three hour tour! https://www.heygo.com/tours/warwick-victorian-evening?utm_source=tour_share_link&utm_content=14104

22/11/2022

Oh dear. On the way down the stairs from the car park to do my first Coventry Cathedral tour today I dropped my gimbal. I thought the problem was that the magnetic clamp flew off - which it had - and after ten minutes of looking for it I gave up and went to the nearby Poundland to see if they had a selfie stick.

They hadn't, but then I saw they had magnetic carphone holders and thought that might work. And it did. Sort of. Having successfully stuck the phone to the gimbal, I then realised was the real problem was that the gimbal itself was also broken.

I couldn't get a replacement in time for the larer tours, well I could but as it is new it needs a full charge before first use and that couldn't be done in time. So the big question now is how long will it take me to make enough in tips to pay for it, bearing in mind it is less than a month since I wrote off my last phone too!!

Hopefully you will be filled with the festive spirit on my next few tours, which started off with a massive three hour tour (does the battery on the new gimbal last this long!?) at the Warwick Victorian Evening on Thursday.

That and more, like all today's tours rescheduled for next week, can be found at www.heygo.com/john-bull.

20/11/2022

Christmas lights switch on tonight in Rugby. Thanks for joining in, and now we all know that a Waltzer and a Tilt Wheel (or Tilt-a-Wheel?) are the same thing! I've got plenty more live streams of festive events coming up in the next month. For details, see www.heygo.com/john-bull

13/11/2022

This evening at 6pm (after I've done a tour round the inside of Kenilworth Castle), I'll be doing a new tour, which started off as the very broad "Grizzly Tales of Warwick", but the more research I've done, the more refined down it has got, becoming Crime and Punishment in the 18th & 19th Centuries. I'm even going to include a song about a man who a fork lift truck company is named after, and if that doesn't hook you, nothing will!

There's certainly enough material for a few more of this type of tour in Warwick, when I can get it into a sensible format.

Book this live-streaming tour with John Bull Tours right now on Heygo.

11/11/2022

All the taxes for the Knightlow Hundred have been paid, so now it's time for the hot rum and milk, which is much nicer this year.

05/11/2022

Bonfire night fireworks display at Kenilworth Castle, 5th November 2022. Sorry it's not as smooth as it could have been, I made sure I had a tripod to have as good a quality vidro as possible, but didn't reslise the top quarter of it disconnects and it wasnt screwed on properly! So that's why it goes a bit shaky a couple of minutes in, but afterwards it's not so bad...

I apologise to everyone who expected to see a live stream. I have done one live stream before when it didn't work because there were simply so many people (or phones) which meant the digital collapsed as a result. That was Buckingham Palace, the day after the Queen died.

I genuinely never expected the same thing could possibly happen in Kenilworth! Though of course it is one of the best in the country, it was a sell-out with 10000 tickets being sold, and of course if there are 10000 who have paid, there's easily another 20000 who haven't on the hills of Abbey Fields and Purlieu Lane.

I promise that when I do a live stream from the castle itself, I won't have the same problems!

05/11/2022

Not long before I'll be doing a live stream from what is consistently rated as one of the best bonfire night fireworks displays in the country. Display due to start at 6.45pm GMT.

https://www.heygo.com/tours/fireworks-at-kenilworth-castle?utm_source=tour_share_link&utm_content=13316

29/10/2022

24/10/2022

This week I'll be talking about Rugby in Rugby, taking an open-top bus tour round Stratford-upon-Avon, and doing my first spooky tour. You can find all the details here https://www.heygo.com/john-bull?displayTab=tours

The schedule is*:
Thu, 27 Oct 9:00am. Rugby: The school and the town that gave the world the game.
Thu, 27 Oct 2:00pm. Rambling Round Rugby.
Thu, 27 Oct 4:00pm. Rugby: The school and the town that gave the world the game.
Fri, 28 Oct 4:00pm. Open Top Bus ride through Shakespeare's Stratford-upon-Avon.
Sun, 30 Oct 6:00pm. Plague, Murder, Witches & Ghosts: The Horrors of Shakespeare's Sheep Street.
*All times BST, except 30th October which is GMT

17/10/2022

This week I'll be back here at Kenilworth Castle on Thursday, after doing historical tours around Royal Leamington Spa and Warwick on Wednesday. Book at https://www.heygo.com/john-bull