Music Tour- Day Nine

Friday was the day we travelled to Bath via Stonehenge.

As we left, we got a view of the Buckingham Palace gardens. Angus said, “Now here’s a photo opportunity I’m not going to miss!” and got out his camera, but soon a bus came and blocked his view. “Oh no!” Angus exclaimed. “Bloody bus!”

We had a rest stop on the way to Stonehenge. At the rest stop, some of the boys had decided to annoy Scotty. They asked me to help by taking his bag and hiding it under the bus. I didn’t do that, but I did run around the buses until I lost him and then ran back on the bus and hid his bag in the toilet. When Scotty got back on the bus, I had to tell him where I put his bag.

Eventually we got to Stonehenge. It was a lot smaller than most people expected it to be. We were given headsets but I don’t think anybody listened to all of the information- there probably wasn’t time anyway. We took several pictures of people in such a way that it looked as if they were holding up Stonehenge with their arms and also a couple of pictures of sheep on the hillside. (Yes, we went to Stonehenge to take pictures of sheep.)

After an hour or so, we set off for Bath. Our first stop in Bath was Parkview Gardens, where we gave a concert for an hour. Halfway through the concert, Jonty went to the cathedral in Bath because Mr Hey said that there was going to be a special Good Friday Mass there. Unfortunately, it turned out that it was cancelled or something so he had to come back and play Marche des Parachutistes Belges. His piccolo wasn’t warmed up so it was extremely out of tune when he had to play. Poor Jonty!

After the concert, some of us left our instruments for the chaperones to look after while we had a guided tour of Bath, which didn’t last for very long. At the end, we had a little bit of time to get an ice cream and watch a horse and carriage tour pass by. Right before we went back on the bus, I asked if there was a toilet nearby because I wanted to avoid using the bus toilet as much as possible, but it was probably going to be a fair distance considering we had to be on the buses soon. In any case, there was going to be a stopover on the way back.

When we were near the buses, I got my clarinet back from the chaperone. When I got on the bus, Alastair had given us another reason to avoid bus toilets.

He dropped one big stinker in there.

Additionally, the bus toilet wasn’t a vacuum toilet: it was worse. It was one of those toilets that had a flap which opens directly over the septic tank, so you can smell of the contents when you flush.

Everyone was cursing Alastair for stinking up the back of the bus. Eden sprayed Eau de Cologne everywhere.

After most of the smell had diminished, Stevie J came on the bus holding a Buffet R13 case, asking for me! I was dumbfounded: I thought I had already put my clarinet into the overheads! Upon further inspection, I saw that Stevie J was indeed holding my clarinet. Confused, I opened the overhead locker and took down… Adrienne’s clarinet! Everyone had a good laugh at the confusion between the identical clarinet cases.

Finally, we set off. On the way, Eric had motion sickness, giving us yet another reason not to go into the bus toilet. At this point, I decided that I would do whatever I could to avoid having to clean toilets for a living.

Eventually, we stopped off at the rest stop, and, after making a massive fool of myself when I bought food, we set off for the youth hostel for the night.