Skegness

Quite a lot has happened to me lately since my last blog. From nearly throwing up in my friend’s, father’s car, arguing in an amusements over a green teddy, skinny-dipping completely naked in the sea and more recently catching the dreaded flu, I’ve had quite an eventful time.

It all started on the 9th of July, well, technically, it started on the 8th of July as I never actually managed to get to sleep that night; I was awake all night ironing my clothes ready for 5 days away with my friends Chantelle, Sophie and Christina. As well as tiredness, I couldn’t help but feel travel sick at the thought of traveling for 2 hours in a car all the way to Skegness from my hometown. Travel sickness has never affected me prior to this, but for some reason my nerves took over and got the better of me and I was eventually sick just before we reached our destination, thankfully my friend’s father pulled over for me to puke into a public bin (classy, huh?).

Once there, we had another 4 hours to spare before we could collect the keys for our caravan. Feeling better, I decided to go to a nearby café as my stomach was starting to feel rather empty, which isn’t surprising as I had just spewed it all up not 20 minutes ago. After enjoying a delicious Sunday roast, we had another 3 hours to spare before we could collect the keys, so we decided on waiting outside a pub just across the road from the camp-site. Of course, we still had all of our suitcases with us, but we had no choice but to carry them with us. I felt as though we were moving in the pub once when walked inside.

Four Kopparbergs and yet another meal later, it was time to enter our caravan. It didn’t take long for me to unpack all of my belongings, organising all of my clothes in order of when I shall be wearing them in the coming days. Being a small caravan, there were only 2 bedrooms, so I had to share a double bed with my friend Sophie while the others had their own singles in a smaller, shared room. Ultimately, we got the better choice as our wardrobe was twice the size of theirs, and we actually had space to move about in our room. Eventually I had drifted off to sleep before our first night out which I ended up missing, though I did catch up on some much needed sleep so not complaining!

Our first full day at Skegness was met with quite miserable weather. As it was raining continuously throughout the day, we didn’t do much other than look around a local market where I bought a new McFly and a Friends poster. We soon headed back to the caravan park where me, Christina and Chantelle visited the amusements for a while, whilst Sophie visited her grandma. Waiting for Christina and Chantelle on the dance-mats, to my right was a claw machine and inside were stuffed-up animal teddies. It was there and then when I fell in love with this green dog and I made it my goal to win it by the end of our holiday.

After about an hour we went back to the caravan to get ready for our first night as a whole group. As expected, I was the first one ready. Chantelle informed us of her desire to play bingo tonight. At first I rolled my eyes (bingo? seriously?!), though we did end up going in the end. I decided to smarten myself up a little for playing bingo so I put on a waistcoat. It was 8 o’clock and the first game of bingo of the night was about to commend. I hadn’t played bingo properly since I was at Primary School so I was unsure of how to play it correctly for a moment. I had no idea the numbers were in order of 10’s in lines. I wish I’d have known this from the start! I didn’t win a row or a full house in the end. Gutted. At least I got to keep my blue dapper, that was the part I was most excited about.

Two more games of Bingo later and we all got increasingly bored. We eventually headed off to another ‘club’ just down the road. Chantelle had been texting a guy who lives in Skegness so we invited him and his friend to come and drink with us in hope to liven the night up. Our plan worked and we were all very drunk after a few shots each. Unfortunately, the club began to close and we were at a loss of what to do with ourselves once outside. Still drunk, Sophie declared that we should all go to the beach nearby.

We all followed with Nicki Minaj’s “Starships” plaguing our heads: “Let’s go to the beach, each”.. this became our motto. After a quarter of an hour walk, we made it to the beach. I don’t think I’ve been to a beach at night before, I got to admit, it was a tad scary at first. Me and Sophie were both still very drunk so we decided to both skinny dip in the sea with our new friend, Nick. I began to undress myself before posing for pictures with the other two, completely naked, before heading off into the sea. I didn’t go too far into the sea as I have a fear of what is actually under their, though the water did kind of warm me up a little. Dressing myself up afterwards was a task with sand everywhere, especially in my boots. It was a very uncomfortable walk back for my feet!

I jumped into the shower as soon as we got back to the caravan. The whole time I couldn’t stop thinking to myself, “I’ve just gotten naked in front of all my friends”, we have no secrets now! Lazily, I put on a hoodie and boxing shorts as putting the rest of my clothes on was too much effort because I wanted to feel warmth with immediate affect having just ran into the sea with no clothes on. We all sat around the couch, talking, before finally dozing off to sleep.

Waking up to my friend’s alarm sound “Starships” brought all the memories of the night before straight to my head. Did I really do all that? Thankfully I didn’t look nearly as rough as I felt as I got myself ready for the long day ahead. I put on my big jacket as my weather app displayed a picture of rain clouds, I didn’t want to get wet. We left our caravan at around 9am to catch a bus into the town centre. We got off at the Skegness Interchange to give us a change to walk through the town centre before visiting the pier.

Local weather soon started to perk up a little and I soon began to feel rather silly walking about in a big, leather coat. We went to the Pleasure Beach where I bought a wristband which gave me access to all of the rides. Being the most daring of the group, I went on all which appealed to me most, though frequently I had to ride them on my own. I did manage to get them all on one little roller-coaster, however. Afterwards, we enjoyed a nice walk along the beach before catching a bus back.  That night, we didn’t really do much else other than walking around seeking fun things to do.

The next day was our last full day so we all woke up really early to start the day ahead. Chantelle and Christina left first to visit Fantasy Island whilst me and Sophie were still getting ready. A while later me and Sophie were ready and we decided to go and visit an Animal Farm just on the way to Fantasy Island. There we got to feed goats and sheep, see many colourful birds and stroke a horse. Being an animal-lover, I was thrilled when 2 lambs escaped their pens to play with the visitors. They were so adorable!

Fantasy Island was our next stop, where we met-up with Christina and Chantelle. Being a roller-coaster-lover, also, there was no-way of me missing a chance of going on them! Though seemed exciting at first, after going on them, they were quite disappointing and the “thrill” factor was at a low. Christina and Chantelle probably got too bored of watching that they left to go into Skegness without us - charming! Me and Sophie stayed a while longer to look around the market again. Nothing really caught our eyes so we finally settled on heading to the bus stop to catch a bus into Skegness.

Lucky for us, our bus was an open-top bus. Of course, we went to sit at the top, right at the back, because who wouldn’t?! The sun was glorious as we rode for 15 minutes on top of the bus feeling glamourous with our shades on. We got off once reaching the Skegness Interchange where our journey terminated. We both seemed high on life come this point, I think it was the thrill of being on an open-top bus, but we were both in a very daring mood.. so daring, in fact, that I very NEARLY got myself a tattoo as we walked through town. Thankfully, the prices put me off! (£50 for a little cross? No, thank you!). We both then headed for the beach where we stayed for a while to rest as we carved our names in the sand, before I bought myself a green monkey from a stall, since I found it was impossible in me winning the green dog I had my heart set on in the claw machine.

Knowing we were all to be up early the next morning, that evening we all packed up all our gear ready for the morning so that we only had little bits and pieces to tidy before we leave. We then got ready for our final night together in Skegness, and this time we were actually going into Skegness! We visited 2 clubs just along the pier and had one of the wildest nights since...uh.. just 2 nights ago! Our time in Skegness soon became to an end and we soon found ourselves back in my friend’s car making our way back to Goole, where I would then spend the next few days covering from a flu (why this blog entry is late!)

All-in-all it was a fantastic trip and I’m glad we all got back in 1 piece, though shamefully left our dignities back there. Hopefully one day we can go again, though, to reclaim them!

 T4 on the Beach 2012

Yesterday, myself and my friend Sophie attended the well-known pop festival, T4 on the Beach. Having seen the line-up beforehand, I was highly doubtful of expecting a joyous time (you’d expect it to have been a little better with it being the 10th anniversary, wouldn’t you?!), but surprisingly I rather did. When I first bought tickets to the event, I was hoping for One Direction to be there, but sadly they were never confirmed but a handful of other artists I had never listened to were. Regardless, like the last time I went to T4OTB back in 2010, these new artists soon became my new current obsessions.

Since we live in a small-town in the North of England, traveling to this event was a pain in the bottom. We both had to set off from our homes at half past 4 in the morning for a 40 minute drive down to the Sheffield Interchange, where we were to catch the coach provided by the National Express to take us further down to Weston-Super-Mare. Due to heavy traffic just outside the location for the festival, we arrived an hour late which means our whole journey there was 6 hours. By the time we finally arrived, we were both already quite tired, and the day had yet to begin.

We both met-up with our other friend, Megan, just along the road next to the beach as we headed down to the entrance for T4 on the Beach. Along the way, we could hear music blaring from the stage but as the singing was so bad, we thought it would have been a comedy band or something. It wasn’t. It was The Wanted. Oops! I’m sort of gutted to have missed them as I have always had a wee crush on Nathan Sykes, never been a fan of their music though so not totally gutted by it. However, they were ultimately my least favorite act of the day purely because of the fact we missed them.

Moving on.. we soon made our way past the gates on into the crowd just in time to see the 2nd act of the day to perform. The female boss of pop came onto the stage just as we joined the crowd and sang some of her old hits from N-Dubz. The presenters then came on and (I think) made the crowd sing happy Birthday to her? I’m not actually sure if it was to her as her birthday is on the 13th (thanks, Wikipedia) but Happy Birthday anyway! Tulisa then sang her solo debut “Young”.

Cover Drive were the next act to perform. I hadn’t really listened to their music prior to seeing them live but nonetheless I enjoyed their performance and “Twilight” has been in my head the whole time as I write this blog. I am definitely a fan of this group now and will be sure to download their music. I then noticed Little Lix come on stage and, of course, booed them. With them, though, was the T4 presenters and Conor Maynard and some other males (they were singers too but I can’t remember who they were!). This then lead to a ball game with the crowd. Due to my personal hatred towards Little Mix, I was thrilled when the boys won.

Three more acts then performed though their music didn’t really engage my interest. According to Wikipedia these were Maverick Sabre, Stooshe and Wretch 32. An act worthy of my attention soon came on however and picked up the atmosphere from the crowd. Alexandra Burke sure got everyone dancing. Must admit, I’m not really a fan of her latest 2 songs as I think they’re very generic pop songs and she is capable of much better, but “Let It Go” was great to dance to, so in this sense, I enjoyed it.

Gradually, our little group of friends were sneaking past our way closer to the stage just in time for the act I was most excited for - Conor Maynard. He sang his newest single “Vegas Girl” before singing is huge hit debut, “Can’t Say No”. By this point I couldn’t stop waving my arms about and singing directly into the camera above us, hoping for a chance on air. It was hot, he was hot and the atmosphere was incredible.

It soon got a little um, less exciting once he had left the stage in time for this year’s Britain’s Got Talent winners perform. I love dogs, I’m a huge animal lover - but not for this dog. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen more talented dogs before. Pudsey is ridiculously overrated, proven by the fact I heard very little cheers coming from the crowd during and after their little act. I think the reason is because it’s not a musical act so you really need to be able to see it to be able to appreciate it. It looked better on television when I watched it back, got to admit, but when you’re there expecting music, it wasn’t great.

Taio Cruz then came on stage and lifted the mood a bit singing a couple of his songs. I’m not really a fan of his myself but his performances weren’t bad. Anyway, DJ Fresh came on afterwards and sang their huge hit “Louder”. This was a highlight of the day, because, not only is it a great song, I was shown on live television during this performance. If you sky plus’d it, I am seen at 98 minutes in with a blue Nikon camera in my face. My nose (unfortunately) was unmissable.

Joining them on stage just before their last song was Rita Ora who sang “Hot Right Now” with them. Rita later stayed on stage and did a little speech about her hit single with Tinie Tempah only a year ago, suggesting an applause for him, which I thought was appropriate as he was my favorite act from T4OTB 2010. She then performed her no. 1 single “R.I.P”. I hadn’t really been a fan of this song before, it is extremely overplayed, but I was impressed by her singing during this performance, not by her outfit choice, though. Just like what happened with Tinie Tempah, after seeing her live, I would now definitely call myself a fan of hers.

Next up on stage was the very annoying Professor Green. I thought his performances sucked. After this torture, he soon left and the presenters then came on stage, followed by Hollie-Jay Bowes (Michaela McQueen), Ashley Margolis (Ricky Campbell) and Matt Littler & Darren Jeffries (Max and O.B.) from the cast of Hollyoaks. They played against the cast of Made in Chelsea where they had to pop as many balls as possible. I couldn’t really see much of this and I’m unsure who won but, with being a self-confessed addict to the show, I hope it was Hollyoaks that won.

Marina and the Diamonds was the next act on stage who sang her greatest “Primadonna”. After this performance, me and my friends decided to leave the crowd to go and get something to eat. We went to a nearby burger van where my friends paid £5 each for a burger. Ridiculous! Being the cheapo I am, I settled for just a tray of hardly cooked chips for £3. We then made our way across the steps on into the next section of the event where there were fair rides and the sessions stage. We stayed in this section for the rest of the event and missed the rest of the acts on the made stage. The only act that bothered me missing was Dappy, I love him! Oh well..

The sessions stage soon got more crowded than the main stage once it was announced that The Midnight Beast were to perform. We waited at least 20 minutes for them to come up on stage after the presenter lied and said it would only be in a “few moments time”. Anyway, it was well worth the wait. I hadn’t been a fan of theirs prior to this so didn’t know any of the words to their songs. Thy choruses are so catchy, though, I soon caught on and sang my way through the whole of their set. This was honestly the best part of the whole day and I have been reminiscent of seeing them live since. They were brilliant!

All-in-all, it was an awesome day. The sun was out for the duration of the event which was an added bonus! I now have a really bad sunburn on my face though. Ouch! The festival was a lot better than I initially expected it to be and a day later I am still amazed at The Midnight Beast’s performances. They were outstanding!

[All images are my own]