Cheadle Hulme

Cheadle Hulme is a suburban area located in the south of Greater Manchester in the North-West of England. (Wikipedia)

So Thursday and Friday saw our annual trip to Alton Towers. I say annual, this is only the second year that we have done it but we have decided to make it an annual trip because it's so much fun. Last year, I wrote in my blog about the funny story regarding the watch that Jenny received from George, that story has passed into folklore and is still told with many a giggle. We also have a story to tell from this year, although this one was less funny at the time. Having said that, it did not take long for me to start laughing, but I think that may have been hysterical laughter.

We had booked to stay in a Bed and Breakfast in a little village called Cheadle, which was about 10 minutes drive from Alton Towers. Using directions printed from the internet, we managed to get onto the M25 only to get lost when I accidentally read the directions as "exit at Junction 17", when it actually said "pass Junction 17". So that was our first accidental detour, which took us onto the A12 and past places like Gidea Park. Anyway, so we managed to get back onto the M25 with the help of Will and a program that V managed to download onto her blackberry, but then, about 5 hours later, I had a sudden realisation that we were heading towards Manchester, and it didn't seem right. So I hazarded a guess that when Anna typed Cheadle into the internet, she hadn't checked that it was Cheadle, Staffordshire. Of course, this is what had happened, it had taken what I can only assume is the bigger or more popular of the two Cheadles, and come up with Cheadle, Cheshire instead. As one can probably imagine, Jen was the least pleased of everyone, especially when we saw a sign stating "You are now entering Manchester". Will thought that we had made a special detour in order to visit the Primark, which would have made it slightly more worth it, but it all turned out OK in the end as it only took us about 50 minutes to get out of Manchester and to the B&B.

Alton Towers itself was fantastic, of course! We bought the Fast Track tickets this time, so we managed to get on Rita, Oblivion, Air, Nemesis and the Flume without queuing for too long. My favourites were Air and Oblivion. We also managed to get on some other things as well because we hadn't queued for too long on the big ones, so if anyone is thinking about going I would definitely recommend the Fast Track tickets!

And I have just realised that I last posted about how I was going to the Ball, and haven't posted since. It was really good, lots of fun but it was so so so so muddy. My feet were so dirty by the end of the evening it was unreal! But I had a good time, and can't wait for next year!