Ok. I’ve been quiet for some time. That may be due to various events that were coming up (and have now passed). Yes, I survived my stage weekend. But equally, I’m now married and honeymooned. I’ll take this opportunity to record what happened at the stag weekend, then add in separate blogs for the wedding and honeymoon. It’s only fair, after all ;o)

Friday

I was picked up by Luis (my best man) on the Friday and driven to a secret location… Lincoln… where most of those attending the weekend met up at a bar. During this time we were visited by a local, “Sleight of Hand Walter”, an elderly gentleman who did the most amazing card tricks.

We then headed off to our abode for the weekend – a wooden lodge in the middle of no-where. We spent the rest of that day drinking ourselves silly and playing poker. Paul even stripped to his pants and decided to swim across the nearby lake. And he did it too. Boy was he drunk.

Saturday
The next morning was my “surprise”. We had to stop soon after
leaving though for Paul to barf at the roadside. He decided it would be best if he didn’t go any further and set off walking back to the lodge. Anyway, we arrived at Humberside Airport. Luis was talking about “wing walking” but as he’d been leading me astray with false comments for months, I didn’t believe it.

As it turned out… I was right to disbelieve him. Ages ago, Luis asked me what I’d always wanted to do. I told him, but knew (as he commented at the time would be the case) it would be too expensive to do this weekend. Somehow though, Luis HAD arranged it. I was to have my first lesson flying a helicopter.

There was some basic training of the controls whilst we were on the ground and then we took to the sky. At this point my instructor was flying. When we got to the Humber Bridge however, she passed control to me. I fly it over the bridge and back again, and even returned it back to the airport. My instructor, however landed it. During our return trip, she showed me what happens when you turn off the engine at 1500ft. It drops, but not too quickly. She restarted the engine in time before we reached the ground – it was all just to show that no-matter what happens, it’s all quite safe.

In all we spent 30 minutes in the air. I now have an official pilots log book with half an hours flight time recorded in it. I now only need 44.5 more before thinking about a pilots licence! Will I do it? In time – when I get my loans paid off.

We then returned back to the lodge to pick up Paul (who was now feeling better) before heading off to all go go-karting. It was great fun – I wasn’t much cop myself though.

That night we tarted our-selves up and headed into Lincoln. We “dined” at the Chicago Rock Café until it was converted into a club for the rest of the evening – we wandered into a few others bars but returned here to dance for most of the evening.

Sunday

Paul and John C left in the morning.

Sunday was an attempt to recover from the night before, as we pulled on walking boots and sturdy trousers and headed off across the fields. Unfortunately I’d brought new boots and I was in agony very quickly. For most of the walk I was in my socks.

After a good few hours, we arrived at a pub that served the most fantastic Sunday carvery. Here we stayed drinking and playing darts until later afternoon. Now it was time for Rob to return home.

The remaining of us went back to the lodge and watched some DVD’s whilst doing what we did best – drinking.

Monday

Not much to say about Monday, other than the fact that we left in the morning. I arrived home early afternoon after a fantastic weekend.

My thanks go to everyone who attended and particularly Luis for organising it all.