A weekend in Blackpool

Look, I consider myself to be a reasonably seasoned traveller now. I've seen a lot of things, been to quite a few places and will probably go to many, many more before this life comes to an end. When my friend Natasha suggested that we go to Blackpool, I didn't think too much of it.

For those of you that don't know, Blackpool is a tourist city just North of Liverpool and Manchester. It is by the sea, the beach has sand and it has a remarkably good roller coaster. It is, so I found out, the most popular tourist destination in Britain. My friends and I spend about 18 hours there. The roller coaster was fantastic, 2 minutes of great, great fun. The rest amounted to 17 hours and 58 minutes of my life which I will never, ever, in my entire life, forget. Blackpool is, without doubt, the seediest, tackiest place I've ever encountered.

The first thing we saw driving in was that the Blackpool library had been boarded up. Having just driven from Liverpool this didn't seem like too much cause for concern, half the houses there are boarded up, maybe its just what people do when they go away for longer than a week.

Turned right onto the seaside promenade though and one's senses are immediately overloaded. It is difficult sitting here to paint an accurate picture of this town. Every fourth commercial area was, in order, an amusement arcade, a fish and chip or kebab shop, a clairvoyant and a pound shop. Put all of them, in order, for the 2 miles or so that the promenade runs for and you're getting close. Add to the picture a multitude of signs in bright, garish colours. Insert massive fairy lights strung between the various streetlamps, and top it all off with stag and hens nights and some very old people walking down the very busy street, and you're getting close. The final touch is Blackpool tower, which was probably built many years ago as a rival to the Eiffel tower. It looked like an oversized oil rig to me.

Unperturbed, we hit the streets in search of food and drink. I hope Tim won't mind me saying this, but he is a picky eater. We all ate at McDonalds, because none of us trusted anything else, however Tim had a rather more difficult time. In fact, when he approached a man on the street looking for a curry, he was told that there was a chip shop around the corner which would put curry sauce on his chips. Says it all really.

We ended up staying the night in an 80's bar. I think we all expected to hear 80's music, however the bar seemed to be half full of people who were approaching 80 years of age. Regardless, we drank their cheap spirits. We needed to after watching the rugby. Anyways, the night is a little fuzzy after that. I remember being approached by a group of skinheads and being asked if we were looking for trouble. I remember the perfume guy in the toilet who tried to get everyone to buy a squirt of aftershave with wonderful sayings like 'No splash no gash'. I remember stumbling home via a karaoke bar, where we sang some Creedence, accompanied by an uninvited guy with a ponytail singing harmonics. I remember us all waking up the next morning in agreement that we needed to leave Blackpool as soon as possible.

It is odd. This country is so beautiful. The Yorkshire Dales were incredible, what I saw of the Lakes district was breathtaking. Even the countryside surrounding London is well worth a visit. All this, and more Brits go to Blackpool than anywhere else. I guess we all want different things out of a holiday.