Blackpool

off the fields & onto the promenade

It’s hard to get away from home for a few days. There are the animals to consider, the expense and the distance and time that it takes us to get anywhere. Recent trips have been an overnight stay in Yorkshire to attend a sheep dipping assessment last Autumn and a 2023 overnight trip to Edinburgh to visit the zoo and eat ice cream cones by Greyfriar Bobbys.

I reckoned that we were overdue a wee break as a family. Time together that doesn’t involve sheep. So we booked a few days away - and now that half of my children are grown up enough to be strapped into a little carriage and thrown down a 230ft rail, where else would we go but Blackpool?

For those of you that aren’t familiar with the United Kingdom, Blackpool is a seaside town in the county of Lancashire in England. Since the 1800s, visitors have flocked to Blackpool for holidays (and here is where I can even link things right back to my usual topic of sheep and wool). Textile mills and factories used to close for a week, allowing workers and their families a chance to get away. Many would save throughout the year for their week in Blackpool, which were known as ‘Wakes Weeks’. This declined after World War II but nonetheless, Blackpool is still a major visitor destination in the UK. My mum took us for the first time when I was a teenager and my husband and I went in the early days of our relationship.

It’s about a nine hour drive from Skye and couldn’t be more different. There are piers crammed with amusement arcades, funfair rides and candyfloss stalls. There are horse and carriage rides along the promenade and donkey rides on the beach. Every fourth building seems to be a fish and chip shop, the shops in between selling famous Blackpool rock sweets and other trinkets for the tourists. Trams operate along the beach front. There is the 518ft tall Blackpool Tower, which is like a mini Eiffel Tower and many other attractions, including a large funfair. In the Autumn, the famous illuminations are switched on and the seafront is lit up with bright lights and displays. There is more to Blackpool though - it is a largely deprived area, and if you venture from the fun-filled front full of visitors, you’ll soon see that.

It was a full on but much needed few days away. As we travelled, I took notes. They are disjointed and rambling, but here are some observations from the trip.

Day 1

We set off down the country. It’s a long drive but I have snacks, sick bags and emergency breakdown numbers at the ready. We stop in Fort William to stretch our legs and I resist the local wool shop. We look in a small shop full of tartan tourist tat. An old gentleman sidles up and tells me that I can buy a Braveheart snowglobe for cheaper here than the shop next door. I tell him that I’m not in the market for a Braveheart snowglobe, he realises that I’m Scottish and we laugh. It becomes obvious that my eldest daughter doesn’t know who Nessie is. I am somewhat shocked and wonder how much of a Highlands parenting fail that is?

Hours later, we find ourselves in a supermarket in a place called Lesmahagow. It sounds familiar and I rack my brains while scanning the Mr Kipling cake range. It comes to me at the checkout. “Shearing!”, I call out triumphantly. “There is a prestigious shearing competition held here every year”. The family look at me. “In the supermarket?”, they tease.

I count livestock lorries on the motorway and watch the little sheep faces peering out.

Day 2

Blackpool Zoo. The animals seem happier here than they did in Edinburgh Zoo. They seem to be exhibiting more natural behaviours and I feel comfortable observing them.

The great grey owls and the orangutans are my favourites. We watch the orangutans for ages. The adult couple have a baby. It ventures too close to the water and the father sweeps in to move him from danger.

We walk around the dinosaur models and a woman with a pram and a toddler calls us over. “I’ve just seen a rabbit! Come and see!”, she says to our children. We all go over to see a little wild rabbit hopping about. The woman is so excited. I think about what she would make of our fields at home, alive with dozens of rabbits and geese and deer. Her joy makes me smile.

In the evening, we ride trams, eat the tastiest fish and chips and head up the Blackpool Tower. Our arrival at the top of the tower coincides with a massive firework display as part of the World Firework Championship (no, I didn’t know it was a thing either). I like the shimmering, fizzly white one, falling like stars. My youngest loves the biggest, loudest ones which explode in reds and blues.

The streets are full of families. Everyone is friendly.

We realise that our money is mainly Scottish banknotes which aren’t technically legal tender in England and can be refused. I feel like a criminal every time I hand one over, but it isn’t a problem. It is refreshing to see young folk on the tills counting change quickly. It’s a dying art.

Day 3

Funfair day. Hurtling down rollercoasters and laughing until my ribs hurt. A man with a grumpy looking teenager in the queue in front of us says, “I’m going to smile to much today to make up for him not smiling!”. Parenting teenagers can be hard work and I smile back.

Back in the day, we all wore wristbands to get onto rides. Now it’s all smartphones, QR codes and adjusting your screen brightness all day so that the machines work. Everyone has their phones out all day. I think how bizarre the world is getting. The Government has announced plans for ID cards and I wonder how long before they just insist on microchipping us all and letting us have days out like this for good behaviour. I don’t wonder for long though because it’s my turn on the rollercoaster.

The rain comes in and we run back to our ‘home’ for the night. There is no oven glove in the house. Who the heck doesn’t use an oven glove?

Day 4

It’s 9am. We’d normally be seeing to sheep but we’re standing at the coin slot machines, depositing all the 2p and 5p that I’ve bundled here from home. Lights flash and music blares. Twenty minutes later, we’ve no change left but the girls have won enough tokens for a lollipop each. I didn’t know that lollipops could be so small. “They were the most expensive lollipops in the world”, I tell them.

We head home. I get tooted at on the motorway and wonder how many of us are in for a speeding ticket. We pass through the Cumbrian hills and comment on how their hills look like our hills. We stop at services for coffee that is far too hot and I side eye those around me, wondering if any of them were the middle lane hoggers.

I drive into a road closure despite the signs. The car in front of me has done the same. I hear them argue their case to the road worker. “You passed five Road Closed signs to get to here”, he point out to the driver. Touché. I U-turn. I’ve lost us an hour but we’ll be home before midnight.