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On Friday 1st October a large group of Year 11 pupils set off
to Blackpool Pleasure Beach for a night of fun, thrills and excitement.
What
they got was a night of traffic jams, wind, rain and long queues
at McDonald’s!
Everyone was ready for the
5.00pm departure apart from the third coach which was held
up because of the Rossendale traffic.
This was a sign of things to come.
We eventually left just after
5.15pm, with Mr Wilbraham assuring his coach that it would
only take an hour to get to Blackpool.
The pupils of 11N and 11R were busy calculating how much time
this would give them on the rides, while Mr Wilbraham was more
interested in calculating many goals his team might lose by
the following day!
We were in the centre of Rawtenstall when
the traffic news on Radio Lancashire announced that the M6
near to Preston was
at a standstill. As a result so was the A6. As a result, so
was virtually every road between Preston and Blackpool. Nice!
The
driver of the leading coach decided he knew the best route
to take which meant going around the elbow of Preston to approach
Blackpool by the coast road. The second coach followed but
the third, a lovely orange number, decided it would go through
the centre of Preston. Big mistake!
The first two coaches crawled
along at pedestrian speed prompting one or two people from
11N and 11R to revise their calculations.
Hopefully the same principle will be applied in next year’s
GCSEs!
Eventually, Blackpool Tower became visible and before
we knew it we were in the Pleasure Beach car park. When I say ‘we’,
I mean the first two coaches only.
It was now well past seven
o’clock but after a few shenanigans
over whether it was actually 1st October, the children were
given their wristbands and they raced off into the distance.
At
around 7.45pm the third coach arrived and those on board were
given their wristbands before they too ran off into the
darkness for a couple of hours on the rides. Or so they thought.
By
now the heavens had opened and most of the staff had taken
shelter in the Beach Restaurant. Unfortunately, the restaurant
stopped serving food after half-past-seven, meaning Mr Grehan
had to content himself with a coke and two bags of crisps.
He wasn’t happy!
Some staff had decided they wanted to
go on the rides, although there’s no truth in the rumour
that Mr Reeves wanted to study the Big One for an A Level Mechanics
project.
Mrs Chapman
and Miss Bartram also headed in that direction, although the
rain made Miss Bartram particularly concerned
about the effect on her hair!
Time meandered on towards 8.30pm
when announcements where made that the park would soon be closing. “What?” cried
BRGS Year 11 in indignation, “We’ve only been here
five minutes.”
Nevertheless, everyone had to make their way to the exits
while Mrs Gregson and Mr Reeves made their way to the Manager’s
Office to find out what was going on. “The park has been
closing at this time all week,” was the response, in
direct contradiction to what we’d been told when we arrived.
So
what now? Parents weren’t expecting their children
until eleven o’clock and nobody was in the mood for sitting
on the coaches through the illuminations, especially Miss Bartram.
The
drivers and Mrs Gregson decided they would take everyone to
a McDonald’s drive-thru, although questions were asked
as to how the coaches would exactly ‘drive through.’
After a few diversions in the centre of Blackpool, including
the orange coach driving on the wrong side of the road, we
eventually found a McDonald’s near to Blackpool FC.
The
coaches parked up and 120 children piled in through the doors.
Let’s just say the McDonald’s workers weren’t “lovin’ it!”
To be fair though, they did a grand job in serving everyone
in the time they did. Big Macs, McChicken Sandwiches, fries,
coke, milk shakes, McFlurrys (but no coffee) etc … were
purchased by Year 11s keen to get something out of the night.
We
dragged ourselves back onto the coach and started the journey
back to school. Everyone was tired and very fed-up, but a great
deal of humour and understanding was shown and for this the
Year 11s and all the staff should take great credit.
Also, many
thanks to Mrs Gregson for organising the trip. It was just
unfortunate that it turned out as it did but we
still had a good time, if not in the way we expected.
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