Wednesday

Day 3
Good evening from the Netherlands!

If Day 1 was an adventure and Day 2 was a storm — quite literally — then Day 3 was something else entirely!

We'll be honest with you. Getting up this morning was a group effort. And by group effort, we mean the teachers did the heavy lifting while the children did the heavy sleeping. Gone are the days of pupils bouncing out of bed. Multiple rooms required repeated knocking. A few required entry. One or two children were essentially reintroduced to consciousness from scratch.
They got there. Eventually.

Breakfast was, once again, an emphatic success. The croissants, fruit, eggs, bacon and cereal had all been replenished overnight and were systematically demolished within the hour. Parents, a word of warning: you are going to need to start sourcing freshly baked croissants for home. Daily. This is no longer a holiday treat — this is an expectation. These children have standards now and they will not be lowering them when they return to Belfast. You have been formally notified.

After breakfast, we boarded the bus and set off for Phantasialand. The excitement on that coach was a living, breathing, palpable thing. We could hear it. We could practically smell it. Several children looked like they might actually vibrate out of their seats. Mr Beckett, we will admit, was not much calmer!

We pulled into the car park as Thunderstruck by AC/DC came blasting over the sound system. If that wasn't a sign that the day was about to be spectacular, we don't know what is. It was getting very, very real.

Miss McCormack distributed the tickets with impressive efficiency, and from that moment on, containment was no longer possible. The children were chomping at the bit. When the barrier finally lifted, poor Mrs O'Neile and the park attendants were nearly taken clean off their feet by 48 children who had been waiting for this moment for months. Health and safety were, briefly, a secondary concern.

First stop was Colorado Adventure — think Thunder Mountain at Disney, but with extra attitude. Here's the thing we're most proud of: without any prior knowledge of what the ride would be like, every single one of our 48 pupils — and all 5 staff — got on. Every. Single. One. No exceptions.
The screaming could be heard from one end of the park to the other. The smiles at the end were enormous. A few faces were slightly shell-shocked, blinking into the daylight like they'd just lived through something. Most immediately wanted to go again.
The staff? Mixed reviews. Mrs Carson is not speaking to Mr Beckett. Again. Towerview had well and truly arrived.

Next up was Black Mamba — a roller coaster that sends you twisting and looping at speed. Feet dangling, no floor beneath you, zero mercy. The children who took it on were absolutely magnificent — the roars going in matched the grins coming out. One of Phantasialand's most iconic rides and our lot handled it like absolute champions.

For those who sat out the Black Mamba, there was the Adventure Trail in Deeper Darker Africa — a climbing, scrambling, sliding outdoor course that sounds straightforward enough. For the children it was a warm-up. For one particular adult, however, it became something of an ordeal.
Mrs Parker found herself on the receiving end of coaching from several of our pupils. "Place one foot here and your other foot there," they advised, with the patient authority of seasoned instructors. She took the guidance in good spirits.

What happened next, however, we are still piecing together. All children completed the trail and made it safely to the meeting point. 4 out of 5 adults arrived. The group waited. A minute passed. Then another. Then another. Then, five minutes later, to the sound of a spontaneous and fully deserved round of applause from 48 children, Mrs Parker emerged. Where she had been, she has not yet fully explained. We are choosing not to press her on it.

After the adventure trail it was time for Chiapas — one of Europe's most impressive log flume rides with an enormous, drenching finale splash. The children were thrilled. Their clothes were not. We got absolutely soaked.

Lunch followed shortly after, which gave everyone a chance to dry out.

After lunch the group split and the afternoon became a glorious blur of rides, screams and memories.
Fly — An incredible flying roller coaster that puts riders face-down in a horizontal position, soaring over the park like a superhero at full speed. Those who went absolutely loved it. Those who watched from the ground below could track exactly where the ride was by the noise coming from above.

Meanwhile, Mrs Carson and Mrs Parker took a smaller group to the Swings. The children loved it so much that one go simply wasn't enough and back they went for a second spin. The teachers were, as you can imagine, absolutely thrilled about this development. Absolutely thrilled!

Then it was Crazy Bats — A ride that you wear a VR headset on whilst going on a roller coaster — the kind of ride where you come out not entirely sure which way is up. Another big hit.

And then there was Taron. Widely regarded as one of the fastest and most intense launches coasters in the world. If Black Mamba was the morning's jaw-dropper, Taron was the afternoon's. The children who rode it wore the expression of people who have just lived through something they will talk about for the rest of their lives. We think they probably will.

As the day drew to a close, we wanted to go out on a high — one last ride, the whole group together. We chose River Quest, a white-knuckle water ride that sends boats spinning and to an entirely unavoidable soaking. Everybody got wet. Most people got very wet. Some people got comprehensively, head-to-toe drenched.
It was the perfect end to a perfect day.

The bus driver, was just quite as delighted with the end. 48 pairs of soggy feet and wet trouser legs climbing back onto his clean coach! 

Most importantly we want you to know, above all the rides and the laughs, today was genuinely special. We watched children face things that scared them and do them anyway. We watched nerves turn into courage, and courage turn into enormous, beaming, can't-stop-talking-about-it pride. They shared their stories with each other on every queue, at every break, all the way home on the bus — comparing moments, celebrating each other, building each other up.
You should be incredibly proud of every one of them. We certainly are.

After dinner, the evening was gentle and lovely — some time in their rooms, some time to get a shower decompress and relax after all the excitement of the day. Tonight bedtime came and was met with very little resistance indeed. The chat that usually drifts through the corridors? Barely a whisper tonight. They are done. Gloriously, happily done.

Five very proud adults signing off. 🎢🌷😴