Just back from Blackpool and here is a view of my thoughts.

Sunday 20/07/2008

Went to Fleetwood for the tram festival which was actually quite good, it was at least three times bigger than I thought it would be and had a great collection of old cars. There were quite a lot of tram spotters around jumping in front of the trams to get a picture, which was quite strange as most of them were the normal trams you see everyday going around Blackpool.

Monday 21/07/2008

Decided to go to the beach for a bit and spent nearly 30 minutes trying to work out where the entrance was. Why are they developing so much of the beach front at the same time? When is this due to be finished?

Went to the pleasure beach for a walk, what a mistake to make! I never knew what was going on but there were nearly 1,000 kids there with bus loads entering by the minute. Left after 30 minutes after nearly get run down ten times – why do they have to run everywhere? The majority of them looked unsupervised as well.

Went to the darts and had to wait in the queue for over an hour as the do not let you until about 15 minutes before it starts, some people had been there for three hours plus. Afterwards we waited for some autographs and got Kevin McDine and Phil Taylor who were both very nice and spent some time with everyone. Rod Harrington signed a few while Steve Beaton nearly ran everyone down trying to get to his car; I suppose that was because he got beat.

Tuesday 22/07/2008

We always go to Clevelys on the Tuesday to do some shopping but we were both a bit disappointed at some of the shops so came back and went to Harry Ramsens. For the second year in a row Harry Ramsdens had no bread and butter pudding, despite being advertised everywhere and it was only 1pm – very disappointing.

Wednesday 23/07/2008

Decided to go to the tower today and it was £16.95 each to get in! Luckily we had some Tesco tokens so we only paid a few pounds each but I think this is far too high a price for the tower especially as there is very little to do in it. The circus as ever was the highlight of the day, although we could not get our preferred seats anymore as everyone is allocated seats.

I think last year we just missed the opening of the “new dinosaur ride” and we were very disappointed with what they have done with it since the last time we were on it two years ago. The old dinosaur ride was great and another reason to go into the tower in the first place. The 3D cinema was good in places but far too short!

I think the tower is very poor value with its current price and unless you have never been before I would not recommend this to anyone. Why do they not give people who pay to get in free tokens for the next day (without circus admission) so you can go in and enjoy the ballroom and have a few drinks? I don’t think we go to the tower next year.

At night we went to the Ricky Tomlinson laughter show which was very good, I only wished they could have given a warning prior to the male nudity in the show so I could have avoided the first three rows!

Ricky spent a good 45 minutes after show signing autographs and posing for photographs which was great.

Thursday 24/07/2008

Went to the tourist information centre on the prom (as the other one has shut!) to enquire about a bus to the model village. As we had already purchased travel cards we were told to wait outside the tower (facing the sea) for the number 20 bus which was due in the next few minutes. We did and we just caught it as it passed going around the corner!

A bit puzzled we asked someone near who said that it doesn’t stop at this stop to pick people up to go to the model village. So after missing that bus and with the next one not due for 30 minutes we decided to get a taxi.

The model village was quite good, not a bad price and a bit bigger than expected. If you could do this on the same day as the zoo then it is recommended.

After coming out we went to the nearest bus stop which had a number 20 on it, please see pic (1)

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And it appeared the next bus was due in 15 minutes; please see pic (2)

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So we waited and no bus turned up although one did go in the opposite direction five minutes later. We decided to wait another 25 minutes on the next one but as it turned up the driver waived to us indicating he was not stopping!

We had waited 40 minutes and he did not even stop for the two of us. Why does the stop have a 20 on it (pic 1) if it doesn’t stop there? Reading the timetable does not clear things up either, it says zoo on it but as the model village is so clear to the zoo this will only confuse people into thinking it will stop at the stop when it has a number 20 on it (pic 1).

I was utterly disgusted by this; surely if the stop has the bus number on it then it should stop there? And why can’t it stop there when it goes past there? How does Blackpool expect people to visit the model village if they will have difficulties coming back?

In the end we had to walk to the Hospital to get a bus back to the tower and even that was a joke as many of the buses timetables has the incorrect information on them. It’s just as well we asked the driver first otherwise we could have ended anywhere.

Blackpool public transport is very confusing even for someone from Great Britain, never mind from somewhere that does not speak or read English.

Went to Madam Tussauds for something to do and it helped as we had our tower tickets still so we got in for half price (maybe this is why they cost so much in the first place?). We only went a few years ago and never expected anything different but what a surprise we got as it was excellent.

They had really improved it since our visit and there are a lot of new interactive bits where you can dress up like people from famous films etc. This is really recommended.

Went to the North Pier for a drink before the QEII show started. Walked in and was told they were closing by a very rude polish girl, the time being 16:05. I thought that was a strange time to close and although there was people still drinking I just walked back out. Half an hour late the same people were still there drinking in the pub, we were late told that it has to shut early to prepare for a wedding there tomorrow.

Went to the QEII show at night and for £14 each we left very disappointed. I thought it would be the Freddy Mercury from the legends show which we saw two years ago who was truly amazing but it wasn’t. Everyone apart from Freddy wore wigs from poundland and the whole show was a tad amateurish.

You know it’s bad when you overhear people on the phone wishing they had stayed in their hotel.

Anyway into the second half and things improve very slightly. They have a bit in the show where they go off and you have to shout them back on, just as well some people had already seen the show and knew what was going on as we were lost. So they got shouted back on and did another few songs and ran off again. So we decided to leave along with quite a few other people before noticing they came back on stage to do more songs. It’s the first time I have left any show before the end, but they didn’t help by going off and back on.

Friday 26/07/2008

The North Pier was closed the whole day for the wedding mentioned above.

Overall it was a great holiday, with the best weather we have had in Blackpool for five years but some things were still a bit annoying.

What an eye sore the new Debenhams building is, they have been building it for ages and the first few years we though they were building a new multi story car park. Because of it we never went into the shopping centre this year for the first time which is disappointing as we used to walk through it every day we were there.

What happened to pricebusters? Although I never bought much from there it was a nice shop to walk around, now like much of Blackpool it looks like a building site.