Brandon's Easter Valencia School Trip

The first week of Brandon's Easter half term has been exciting for him as he was off sunning himself in Valencia for a Geography school trip. It has been such an amazing experience for him and judging from the pictures and what he has told us, he had an absolutely incredible time. I won't add my usual commentary to each picture as these are all Brandon's pictures and I wasn't there. I have really just dumped them on the blog as a future memory for him to look back on.

It has been lovely to have him back home though as I am not sure he has been eating and drinking very well. He took £150 plus some money on his card which was supposed to be €30 a day for lunch plus some spending money. Breakfast and dinner were included with the hotel - but he never got up early enough for breakfast and he didn't eat much lunch as he spent all his money on a Jack Jones track suit and a Nike Jordan t-shirt and cap!!!!!!!!!

Anyay during their trip they had a guided tour of Albufera and Rice company, visited the Museo de las Fallas and Las Arenas beach, had a trip the world famous science and hydro and oceanography centre, a Buffet lunch and sightseeing of the Jardin de Turia and visited Sant Joseph caves for a boat excursion.

Mid trip we also received a really nice email from the trips lead teacher saying how proud she was of all the kids and how well they had all behaved and were a credit to the school and the parents and that she couldn't be there with a nicer group of kids. Anyway here is the dump of all the pictures we received from the trip.

Easter Trail at Hyde Hall

Yesterday me and Holly headed over to Hyde Hall in the afternoon to meet up with some of the family and to complete the Easter Egg trail. The trail entailed using clues to search out 10 giant decorated Easter Eggs and in return Holly earned a chocolate cookie dough bunny sweet. We only spent about2 hours over there and kind of raced around the hunt finishing at the play area where Holly spent most of her time with Rory. Still it was nice to get outside and see signs of spring at last. Holly also bought 3 new plants for in her bedroom (to out door her brothers plastic plants) and we also bought some new herb plants for the garden.

The final Easter Egg on the trail which was located conveniently at the play area.

Holly's New 24" Wheel Bike

Over the last year it had become clear that Holly was rapidly outgrowing her old bike which was given to her by Leyla. So I have been on the search for a replacement and earlier this week one of the women from Crossit Rayleigh was setting off travelling Asia and wanted a quick sale on her hardly used bike. So we managed to get an absolute bargain and picked up a bigger bike with 24" wheels in a nice purple/silver colour for just £20 and it even has 15 gears and front suspension (bargain). Even better we managed to sell her old bike for £20 so the new one was effectively free!

Holly's first ride on her new 24" wheel bike.

Off she sets, no problems with the bigger, heaver bike.

We need to buy her a new bell and bike stand for it, but otherwise the bike is as new.

Ninja Warrior UK with Holly

At the start of the week I took off a few extra days to spend some time with the kiddies over Easter (even though Brandon has been off in Valencia all week on a school trip). Anyway for months I have been promising to take Holly to Ninja Warrior UK in Chelmsford and finally got around to booking it on Tuesday.

The venue is pretty impressive and has two full size Ninja Warrior courses, one which is full on adult mode and then one which seems to be suited to people around Holly's age/size up to younger teenagers. Then there is a really impressive inflatable area which is about 4 times the size of the Ninja Warrior courses.

Holly was only booked for an hour but ended up spending about an hour and 20 mins in there. When her time was up she was completely exhausted, sweaty and very red faced. There is a small Ninja wall at the end of one of the courses and then a full size one on the adult course. Holly managed the smaller one several times but failed dismally on the full size adult one. However she thoroughly enjoyed the experience and will definitely be going again only next time hopefully with some of her friends to keep her company.

Finally I got Holly booked in to Ninja Warrior UK.

The hop steps where just a little too far apart for her to make all 4.

Shuffling along the beam.

Ready to jump off of the second beam.

Traversing the cargo net.

Then on to the swinging discs.

I think this is cheating as you are supposed to walk across these.

Hanging on to the swinging punch bags.

And up the junior Ninja wall.

It is still pretty high for Holly and she had to give it some welly to get up these.

Climbing the mountain in the center of the venue to come down the drop slide.

At the top and ready to slide down.

You can't really get many good picture in the inflatable area without physically going in there.

Holly must have done the Ninja wall about 10 times.

Down the slide.

This was probably the only obstacle on the adult course that Holly could do. Most of them she couldn't even reach.

With skill and patience she made it all the way across.

Climbing the mountain again.

At the entrance to the inflatable area.

Someone is about to do the splits!!!

One last run around before her time was up.

After Ninja Warrior I took Holly in to Chelmsford Town for some lunch where we found Bumble Bee and Optimus Prime on display.