Outings

I've had a lovely week, it was the last week of school so activities all week and the last day (whoop whoop!) which is always fab.  On Thursday I had the hardship of accompanying Years 9 and 10 on a visit to Alton Towers, along with practically every other school in the country! As a member of staff it is important that you should test out the rides, particularly the fast ones :o)  So Rita, Oblivion, Nemesis (ultimate fave) and Air were thoroughly checked out for suitability (using a brilliant Fastrack ticket - a rip off, but made the queues bearable - I didn't queue more than half an hour each ride as opposed to 2!)

I managed to take next to no pics of the rides themselves - the camera only really came out when I went around the Towers.  However, I did manage to take a pic of the most scariest ride..........

The carriages even bobbed up and down in the wind - eeeek!

We queued for the new ride TH13TEEN but had to come out of it as we were nearly out of time so went for a nosy around the house instead.  I'd been around it before - it has been left as it was after it was totally stripped of all things valuable (and not valuable but priceless) in the 1950s.  Recently it has been made safe for the public to walk around and they've even put a ride called Hex inside it (linked to the ghostly history - we went on this too, but I didn't see any ghosties).  The rest is still empty - derelict even, which I actually loved.  It kind of feels like you have discovered it and no-one else has been there for decades.  It was totally empty of other people too - crazy considering there must have been thousands and thousands of people there!

Alton Towers from the front looking all Gothic and interesting.

Inside....  There are lots of area showing decay of the building and wonderful spooky corridors.  The windows were often broken or missing and areas were left open to the elements.

On the roof you can see for miles.  Alton Towers does not build any rides higher than the trees which means that from the surrounding countryside you can't see the theme park until you arrive at the gate.  The Tower roof tops are the highest structure around and look over the park and gardens (these are fabulous too, though we didn't venture there this year).

Looking down on Oblivion :o)

When my friends were just starting to get a little jittery :o)  We came across this....

"It's like it's set up for a seance" ha ha!!  ...but it had...!  This room has obviously been kitted out for Ghostly events, with debris everywhere and a sound system and lighting in place too.  They even had 'scary' doors.  

Now, I took this photo, but I was sure it was sharply in focus - whoooOOOooo!

I had a look to see if Most Haunted had been to Alton Towers and what d'ya know..? Most Haunted at Alton Towers. Glad I didn't watch it before I went around the house :o)

All in all it was a fab day.  Rain was threatened, but we avoided it, I had some pure adrenalin rushes and some history and adventure.  Great!

Saturday my folks came up for a weekend visit.  We went to Shardlow Village's 'Music on the Green' event.  It was a great night and we were entertained by The Sandiagos a terrific band made up of several ex-students playing 50's & 60's rock and rockabilly music.  Note the Girlie sitting there at the front :o)