Furie's second epic East Coast Trip (will make Taylor cry)

[furie]

Sadly, not the East Coast of the US of A, but rather Great Britain.

It's also not that epic, but at least the trip report title made you look in here!

I do think I could have Taylor in tears though by part three, we'll see...

Like all epic reports, this shall be a day by day account of it all...

We started badly... I had major issues at work on Wednesday night and Thursday. I needed to wait until I'd tested everything after work before finding out if we'd be able to make the trip Thursday night.

Knowing our destination, some would say "pray for failure"

The Final Destination? Skegness Butlins. For those from abroad, Butlins was the pioneer in holiday camps in the UK. Imagine concentration camps only with worse food and forced amusement - it's quite similar

Luckily, we had a break on the way there in a cheap Travelodge room outside of Lincoln. This broke the three hour plus journey up a bit so we didn't have to rush in the morning (mornings and rush are two words never to use around madame_furie ).

Here is the lovely lodge!

It looks just like all the others!

One huge breakfast on, and we're heading for our first port of call - Bottons Pleasure Beach. We're not allowed to book into Butlins until 4:00 p.m. so we decided to hit the Pleasure Beach for an hour or so to keep the children entertained (plus of course, coasters family_furie haven't yet been on ).

However! Look at what we passed (not my photo):

I didn't realise there was one. Imagine my disappointment when I found out there was no Sleeping Beauty Castle or any kind of Disney-esqueness at all. Less indeed!

Well, that's the Disney fanboys upset, may as well do the same for the Thorpe fanboys!

Everywhere around he was called Thorpe! It's really common, but even after seeing this sign:

I couldn't find a single mediocre ride anywhere!

Actually, that sign really annoyed me. It means hidden speed cameras. It annoys me for two reasons.

1. Speed cameras are meant to be "safety cameras". Their obvious presence is supposed to slow traffic. It's the fact they're visible which is supposed to mean they're for safety no money making. Hidden cameras makes a mockery of that argument.

2. If you have Stealth Cameras... Don't put signs up telling people? "Secret Nuclear Bunker" anyone?

Where was I? Ahhhh! Bee coaster of course! We arrived in Skegness and parked up on the delightful sea front (yes, there was a touch of sarcasm there).

Had to head for the bee coaster first, as Maxi-Minor_Furie was very excited about it!

Bees on a coaster!

Excited maxi-minor_furie!

We got four laps of the coaster! Bargainous! It's a great kiddie coaster I suppose. Better than a mini-apple and all that!

Can anyone say "Copyright infringement"? (other than me in all of my recent trip reports?

No, this wasn't at Norton Disney!

Nephew-of_furie shouting "Is this a credit?"

Speaking of which, a certain ride at Skegness is notorious for stalling halfway round the circuit. It was very windy when we arrived, but they still sent it out, and guess what? Yep, it stalled halfway around!

The thing that got us though was the technique for getting it back to the station!!! I thought they#d have some kind of fancy device or something... Not just send a greasy bloke up to give it a shove... But he did!

Maxi-Minor_furie thought it was really funny

But it was okay, it made it round for us!

There was another "credit" in the park open (the Big Apple), but we skipped it, because we're we're uber hardcore enthusiasts who don't actually give a stuff!

so, we left Skegness and Bottons and headed for our weekend home away from home! Butlins!

all the entertainment is gathered under this massive tent thing. I use the word entertainment in the loosest possible way.

Although the seven foot tall walking robot was actually almost awesome!

Some areas you had to tip toe through though to make sure you didn't upset them...

And just for Ollie!

They had this Pataponic bus from Sony on site all weekend. Several PSP's and PS3's advertising the new Sony Summer experience.

And that was it for day one. Tomorrow we have fun fairs, Fantasy Island, Bears, Trains, Planes and Automobiles! Hurrah!

 

[nealbie]

Actually, that sign really annoyed me. It means hidden speed cameras. It annoys me for two reasons.

1. Speed cameras are meant to be "safety cameras". Their obvious presence is supposed to slow traffic. It's the fact they're visible which is supposed to mean they're for safety no money making. Hidden cameras makes a mockery of that argument.

2. If you have Stealth Cameras... Don't put signs up telling people? "Secret Nuclear Bunker" anyone?

Surely point number 2 returns the Stealth Camera to the realms of point number 1? :wink:

 

[furie]

Yes it does Neal, which makes it even more irritating they didn't just plonk a big yellow box ont he side of the road

 

[nealbie]

Yes. The effort and tax payers money has indeed been wasted there. :lol:

Plus, if you go over 80mph it is worth noting that the flash of the Stealth camera will miss the fast moving vehicle. :wink:

 

[marc]

I would not worry about the Stealth cameras as if they are anything like Stealth they will not work half the time

Hard to tell if you enjoyed it or not tbh from the report, it does not look like you did. Have tbh I hated the place.

 

[Aaron]

Re: Furie's second epic East Coast Trip (will make Taylor cr

Had to head for the bee coaster first, as Maxi-Minor_Furie was very excited about it!

Bees on a coaster!

Cripes, don't tell Laura, she'll be off to Skegness as soon as she can drag me into the car! (She loves bees!)

Nice TR, look forward to the next installments!

 

[LiveForTheLaunch]

What happens in part three that will make me cry?

And that looks like a fun day, good stuff for not whoring the Apple coaster! The bee thing looks sooo cute and Maxi-Minor looked like he was having such a fab time on it!

 

[furie]

Hard to tell if you enjoyed it or not tbh from the report, it does not look like you did. Have tbh I hated the place.

It's because I don't know if I enjoyed it or not :lol:

It's an odd one really. When you go these places with a family, you have different priorities to going for yourself. If it's clean (enough), Friendly (enough), safe (enough) and above all else, fun for the kids - then it's a good place.

However, sometimes you can have these things and a place still be something you personally enjoy. Milky Way, Twin Lakes, Wicksteed and a few other places come to mind. So I enjoyed it because there was plenty to do and it was easy and relatively stress free to entertain the kids. However personally it didn't really make any impact positive or negative.

What happens in part three that will make me cry?

You're going to have to keep on reading aren't you?

And that looks like a fun day, good stuff for not whoring the Apple coaster! The bee thing looks sooo cute and Maxi-Minor looked like he was having such a fab time on it!

I was proud of us The bee thing is rubbish, but looks great.

Cripes, don't tell Laura, she'll be off to Skegness as soon as she can drag me into the car! (She loves bees!)

Nice TR, look forward to the next installments!

It's not a million miles from Mingerland!

Next instalment in a few minutes

 

[furie]

So, where was I? Day two? Early morning for family_furie, lots to do today. As well as the organised activities, I also have to go shopping in Skegness for food for the weekend, and find wifi to be able to do make sure the broken stuff before I left is still in a fixed state!

We start with a bit of bear-like disco though!

Bit loud and hectic for early morning. Still could be worse somehow...

While this was going on, I booked archery for a few family_furie reprobates. I also booked tickets for MMF and Madame_Furie to go and watch the Loony Tunes show! I don't have pictures of that, I was shooting!

As was Minor_Furie!

After doing our various activities, we met on the beach and had a play in the wind for a while. I made a sand model.

You win a name_furie if you guess what it is:

Here's a view back from the beach of the main entertainment complex- it is pretty huge!

One thing to do while I was here, was to go 1/4 of a mile up the road to Fantasy Island and ride Jubilee Odyssey. I want to work out if it really was as good as I thought.

Unfortunately, it won't run in mild wind. Today was very, very windy! So this is as close as I got to Odyssey.

Maybe tomorrow - nothing ran at any point today as far as I could see, except the shot/drop tower once or twice.

Still, the wind meant we could play with kites.

brother-of-step-sister-in-law_furie here helping Maxi-Minor_Furie

The kite!

After lunch, it was time for a "train ride"

This took us teasingly right up to the grounds of Fantasy Island where we all looked at the complete lack of anything running

"Can you see Jubilee Odyssey running step-niece-in-law-of_furie?"

Nope - so off to the kiddie area back at Butlins then!
Funtime planes!

and rubbish cars.

Maxi-Minor_Furie was bored with this though and went swimming instead.

After that, I ended up running a creche for some reason :lol: To entertain the three kids I had, I got out the Playdoh!

We all pitched in and made ourselves a Panda Bear eating a plant!

Half an hour well spent I think! It's not still in one piece sadly!

We were nicely into night time riding though at the fair on-site! hurrah!

Madame_Furie and MMF ready for some odd willy lift.

Whooooosh!

Tomorrow we have penguins dancing! Skeletons dancing! Crazy golf! Dogs! Karts! And the fantastic illuminations!!!

 

[Aaron]

You win a name_furie if you guess what it is:

it's a crab!

 

[Martyn B]

Yeah it doesn't sound like you enjoyed yourself much really, and Skeggy is a fab place! Its so nice and clean compared to the likes of Blackpool and Yarmouth, and there's so much to do there for all the family (no I do not work for Skegness Council )

Look forward to seeing some more piccies!

 

[Ali]

You win a name_furie if you guess what it is:

It's a turtle/tortoise!

 

[Ormerod]

It's SW6 groundwork

 

[furie]

it's a crab!

Well done Az - it must have been better than I thought

You can be... hmmm... Sandy-Claws_Furie

Yeah it doesn't sound like you enjoyed yourself much really, and Skeggy is a fab place! Its so nice and clean compared to the likes of Blackpool and Yarmouth, and there's so much to do there for all the family (no I do not work for Skegness Council )

Look forward to seeing some more piccies!

I like the cleanliness of Skegness. It's not as hustle bustle as Blackpool or anywhere like that. It's also great for the kids and you can see they're fighting against it becoming run down. I have a fair amount of respect for the place to be honest.

However, as you say "there's so much to do there for all the family". Almost true. Minor_Furie at 13 was difficult to keep entertained. Likewise, I enjoyed the family element, but there was very little there that appealed to me personally either. Yes, there's Fantasy Island, but I hate the place - it's nasty a grot hole.

The main sea front at Skegness though is one of the better ones I've been to. It's just there's not much to appeal to me

I realised I need to do a four day report, and Taylor's sadness will be on day four, not day three. So I may do two days today to get it over and done with

So, Day Three begins with exercises with Pingu! Maxi-Minor_furie joined in a for a while!

It has to be said, the girl running it didn't look like she done that many exercises with Pingu...

Maxi-Minor_Furie sat down and laughed at Madame_Furie who was left looking like a muppet pretending to waddle like a penguin.
He was most amused!

Madame_Furie was not!

She suggested little boys who laugh at their mums and don't do exercises don't get chocolate!

Not laughing now are you?

Right after the Pingu exercise was a puppet show! It was a Haunted House story, so Maxi-Minor_Furie was exceptionally excited about it. We sent Minor_Furie off to the cinema with cousins-of-Minor_furie to see G-Force (meh they said).

The puppet show was pretty good to be honest. The puppeteers came out before it started and interacted with the kids and parents. They were really good (in fact, all the staff at Butlins were excellent).

I was sitting at the front, and it was decided that if the ghosts got out of hand, I would help, being as I was!

Ghostbuster_Furie

The show had lots of ghosts and stuff. Really excellent spider puppet and the Bones brothers!

It was a long show (thirty minutes), but was entertaining.

Coming away from it, I noticed somebody was in the little pay-per-play simulator. They had a monitor outside, and I thought "That's Vekoma track!". Closer inspection revealed it was a show of three Alton coasters! Corkscrew (Pre Ugland), Runaway Minetrain and... The Beast (In Forbidden Valley pre-Nemesis).

Obviously, I had to have a go with Maxi-Minor_Furie. It was funny watching him put his arms up on the drops.

If only I'd recorded it eh and put it onto Youtube?

Kerrrrazy Golf next (I think this is miniature golf over the waters). It's not very crazy to be honest.

But SSIL_Furie is!

Using it as a guitar! I ask you!

We got stuck behind some downs kids taking ages, so MMF and SSIL_Furie both entertained themselves in the boat!

The Playstation Bus was still there, this time with added dog seats. The entire thing stank of Sony trying to be "cool".

Still, MMF loved the dog seat and his cuddly dog sat on one

Bit of fairground fun then for the afternoon. You had to pay for the inflatables, but it wasn't too bad.

Though MMF doesn't look like he's enjoying it!

He did really, I just caught him in that perfect "my pants are about to fill" moment you get when leaping off something tall!

Everyone played on a the petrol go-karts (I had the two seater with MMF). These are always fun, but they never go as fast as you want. They seem to cut out at random times too. I had MMF playnig the giggling imp next to me all the way around.

We let him play on one he could drive himself afterwards!

The hat came from a member of staff. MMF was climbing on a railing outside a staff office (being a brat ) and this member of staff came out with the hard hat. She just gave it to him - apparently they had foungd a load in the back room and wanted to get rid of them. MMF wore it all day

We had a birthday party for one of the less important family members, so I wont go into it other than to say the rhubarb crumble and custard was delish

Evening came and we'd arranged to go and see... "The Skegness Illuminations"

Bound to put Blackpool's to shame!

They were nice enough I guess - it was a quiet walk around just a few. It wasn't as garish and naff as Blackpool, but that meant it also looked a bit cheap!

This leads into Bottons, but...

Bottons is closed I know it's out of season, so can understand it being shut, but a few lights from the Pleasure Beach would have made some difference.

Look at Blackpool!!!

The gay dancing fisherman who seems to be the symbol of Skegness!

And finally, this place made me laugh!

Do they sell sand? Pebbles? Oil? You can make any type of UK beach you like!

Next time then, we leave Skegness and I shall try to make Taylor cry!

Oh, complete Facebook album here:
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=6 ... 1043162436

 

[LiveForTheLaunch]

Aw day two looked fun aside from the Jubilee Odyssey missage! I was gonna say that sand thing was a turtle but someone already beat me to it, damn.

Day three? OH MY GOD, PIN-FRIGGIN-GU! I LOVE him! Once in a while I still pull out my Pingu tapes and watch them with my little sister.. Well.. MAYBE with my little sister.. Haha. Dunno if you've ever seen it but the episode where he gets stuck in the snowman nearly makes me cry . Shame that the other place (Bottons or whatever) was closed, but it looks like everyone was enjoying themselves anyway!

 

[furie]

Bottons was where the Bee coaster is - so we'd already been on it in the daytime. It just looked bad being all dark and crap when they had these "illuminations" on.

Part four after lunch! Hankies at the ready!

 

[furie]

Hey there! I see you're new here. Welcome to the Skegness Natureland Seal sanctuary.

Don't you cry none! My name's Trigger, I've been here about a month now - just long enough to have learned the ropes. We'll make sure you're alright.

I see you're in a mess little buddy, dog got at you? We see a lot like you in here. Me? Not a dog, just stupid I guess. I got separated from my folks, saw something shiny and thought it was a fish - turned out to be a rusty old can. Cut my mouth up pretty bad. Couldn't eat and the next thing you know, they're dragging you exhausted off the North beach.

Hey, look little pup, don't you worry. The guys here will be able to fix you up, sure they will. him?Pike? Yeah, he's had to come back into the ward. The eye infection is bad, he's going to lose it, but don't let that worry you. If they can't let you back out into the wild, they'll keep you here. It's not freedom, but its three squares a day at least eh?

You just need a friend in here - I learned that quick. Little guy next to me done die of a broken heart my first day in. He was only two week's old too, but I guess he just couldn't take it any more. I heard him crying in the night, shouting for his folks that weren't never gonna come. Then the crying stopped. They took him away in a tarp the next day. Not a great start to your stay here I can tell ya. So come on buddy, let's go and have looksee around your new home.

This here's Ronny! He's the world's most optimistic duck. Sits there for hours on end looking at those bloaters

He's either waiting for him to get bigger, or them to get get smaller. Aint gonna happen Ronny old pal.

In the pens over here we have the land mammals. We tend not to get on too much, they can't swim, we can't walk. Each to their own I guess.

This pair are always looking for ways out. The humes call 'em Flopsy and Mopsy. They like to call themselves Gargantuan the Great and Wandero the Wonderful! Funny creatures rabbits.

This guy's in charge of the Guinea Pigs.

Squeeks. He sends his pack out hunting and foraging all day. I don't quite know what they're looking for, and neither does Squeeks, but I guess it keeps the fluffy little critters from going stir crazy - he gives 'em a purpose.

Now, back away son! Don't get too close to this fella! He'll have your whiskers in a flash. All these things do is eat and bleat.

Sometimes the bleat then eat, but as long as it involves one or other, they're doing their stuff.

Close to the eater bleaters are the Penguins. These guys are pretty cool, even for Jackasses!

Rose on the left there is a cool chick. She'll get the party going at night and Marv and Huck soon get it kicking. If you hear them getting down at night, just sit back and enjoy.

The duck? Ah, yeah... Poor guy. Thinks he's a penguin. Hatched next to the penguin enclosure at Edinburgh zoo and imprinted. Flew south for the summer and ended up here. They put up with him, for the moment, but I guess that's only as long as the fish are plentiful.

Come on into the glass house my friend. It's warm in here and there are some real pretties.

Look around, you'll see 'em fluttering by

Those eye really freak me out something bad though. Know what I mean?

Wanna see something funny? Just promise to leave laughing until you're outside. This here's Ernie

You ever see anything so ridiculous in your born weeks?

Well, we'd best get back to the pool now, it's nearly time for chow. You feeling a little better? Yeah? Good news. See, we can all get on and recover. Marlin here

Brother died the night he was brought in, Marlin didn't know until after he'd come in he had kin in here. He's pretty much over it now too, but it was rough for a couple of week's there for him.

Hey. Come on then, chow time. See the guy with the bucket? Yep, he's the one to watch

Let's get to it, there's only so much fish I can handle by myself

What do you mean you feel sorry for the fish?

Just because they is giving you the sad face?

Grow up little pup, let's eat!

(based on true happenings at the seal sanctuary
http://www.skegnessnatureland.co.uk/news.htm )

 

[Ormerod]

Fish & goat eyes for the lose!


One of them Seals looks so funny, just sat on a slab of concrete staring at the camera.

 

[ECG]

What a great story! Thanks Furie :--D

 

[Martyn B]

LOL! You muppet! Great pics again!

Kudos about Botton's lights, as they do actually look fab when they're lit up! And yeah, Fantasy Island is such a nasty place, but, it is improving...slowly.