Night lights, bright lights, white lights, street lights, red lights, green lights, even blue lights but I'm now at the Paragon station, so now it’s now time for the highlights.
6.15am We assemble at Paragon Station for what I personally believe as the ideal London experience for children.
A HEYCU Experience Lead and the volunteers (including myself), teachers, and a class full of kids are organised, photos with Phillip Larkin are completed, the 7.00am direct train to Kings Cross awaits.
Anxious adults/parents, caring teachers, chilled HEYCU team, the excited kids it’s all going on.
We line everyone up and off to the platform we go.
So we count them all out.
The train arrives and we count them all in.
Our HEYCU Lead allocates seats, coats and bags are safely stowed away, we introduce ourselves and the chats begin.
Is this a first train ride? For many it is.
Kids asking, ‘Can I start eating yet?’ As it’s just 7am, hopefully we can persuade them to wait a while!
‘Can you see any giraffes as you look out of the windows?’ Oh yes you can, and even before we leave Hull.
‘Can you count the number of railway tunnels we pass before we reach Kings Cross?’
We see the Humber Bridge and Estuary.
‘Keep counting those tunnels.’
Where are we going, what will we see, what could today’s highlights be? There are so many possibilities for a HEYCU London Day trip:
Tottenham Hotspur and Arsenal football stadiums.
Eurostar trains.
The London Underground.
Green Park.
St. James Park.
Buckingham Palace.
Horse-guards Parade.
The 2 Cenotaphs.
Downing Street - Sometimes we even get access to the front door.
Stories of King Charles the 1st 2nd and 3rd.
Elizabeth’s Tower which houses Big Ben.
Nelsons Column and Trafalgar Square.
The Palace of Westminster (Houses of Parliament) - If the school have been successful in getting a slot they will have tour of parliament and a tutorial on what the parliament actually does.
Horses on plinths- all with a story to tell.
The London Eye.
The London Eye River Cruise, The Silver Bonito.
The “Kim Kardashian” building.
St. Paul’s Cathedral.
The Shard and The Gherkin, the ‘cheese grater’.
The left-bank theatres.
HMS Belfast.
The Tower of London and Traitors Gate
London Bridge.
Tower Bridge.
Lots of Harry Potter Film locations.
The Natural History Museum.
The Science Museum and it’s Wonderlab
And of course a souvenir shop.
The cards are dealt, Uno, Fish, Dobble, other games aplenty are on display, magic tricks from the adults cause some “wow moments”.
Have we time for a quiz? Of course we have.
We arrive at the 1st Station, Brough – ‘Is this our stop?’ they ask. No, sorry, just sit back and relax for another 2 and a half hours.
The food buzzer seems to go off in their heads and the lunches are tempting, but breakfast bars are good, so save lunch for lunchtime.
The rubbish is collected on numerous occasions, and the teachers are back and forth with taking children to the toilet.
We are nearing London and point out some sites, last of the rubbish collected and last trip to the toilets.
We see Ally Pally, the football grounds, and how many tunnels was it? It was 13 - believe me, I’ve counted them dozens of times.
9.51am the train arrives, London is here, so we count them all out and split into our groups
We enter the London underground for our first journey of the day to Westminster station, some trepidation from the kids is expected, but calming words from the team soon settle everyone.
“Stand on the right” is the call from the back, the kids and the group all heed the call.
Onto our platform, our train is next, can we get a wave from the driver we ask as it brings us good luck. The wave is returned so we are in for a great day, on to the “tube” and we are on our way.
We alight at Westminster and walk to the parliament building, met by our host we safely check in, security checks done we can offload our bags, and off on our tour we go.
Into the Kings robing area he uses for his annual visit, admire the grandeur, the art and the statues, learn about Henry VIII and his wives.
Into the Great Hall where the famous have spoken, stories are told and the kids listen intently, souvenir photos are taken.
Off to the Commons public gallery to watch a debate, down to the Lords and we are allowed into the chamber, no sitting on seats though, unless you’re a Lord or Lady of course.
The tour is over and our lesson awaits, how to make laws and have good debates.
The law is accepted and the kids all agree it was a great experience.. but is it lunchtime yet?
Then we counted them all out.
More walking to Downing Street and more photos with Number 10 in the background, sadly no visit to the doorstep today.
A walk across Westminster Bridge and a lesson on Elizabeth Tower and onwards.
Which will we do River Cruise and The London Eye? Today we will cruise.
Before our cruise departs, we make a quick stop to Jubilee Gardens play area to burn off some energy and work up the lunchtime appetite, not that it’s needed.
We are all aboard for our London River Cruise (I know we are all on board as we counted them all in), now is the chance for us all to enjoy our packed lunches (officially) and take in the lovely sites and great commentary from our River Cruise guide.
A great educational trip for us all with many facts and figures given to us by an excellent guide (thanks Jordan!) and then we counted them all out.
Cruise over, we head for the souvenir shop to spend the allowance the kids have brought, souvenirs for not only themselves but thoughtfully for their brothers, sisters, grandparents and adults at home. A freebie from the shop owners is gratefully received -all the kids are gifted a London themed pencil.
Perhaps later if time allows, we will visit Trafalgar Square for photos under Nelson’s Column.
It’s time to return to the underground for our journey to South Kensington and the Museum District. We have choices and sometimes we can fit both the Natural History Museum and the Science Museum into our itinerary.
If we visit the Science Museum, we try to book the Wonderlab gallery. The Wonderlab is a hands-on theme room where the kids learn about all aspects of science in a fun way, the kids really enjoy this experience and fully partake in all of the activities. If time allows we go in search of Jason - Jason is the name of Amy Johnson’s Aircraft.
The Natural History Museum is vast and it’s left to the kids (with adult supervision of course) as to where we go. Usually the dinosaurs, the earthquake zone, and the creepy crawlies are some of the favourites. Sometimes the kids even do a Lego workshop on coding!
Whether we go to the Science Museum, NHM Museum or both, we count them all in and we count them all out.
Leaving the museums, we arrive at Green Park Station and walk through Green Park to Buckingham Palace, everyone’s hoping we be lucky and see King Charles III or the changing of the guard as HEYCU groups have seen both in the past. Not so lucky today but the school teachers take lots of photos before we walk to Horse Guards for more photos with the guards and the horses.
Time to head back, our final underground trip has been successfully navigated and we have reached Kings Cross at the end our visit, with any apprehensive kids from early in the day, now fully confident on tube travelling.
We arrive back at Kings Cross and again the kids tuck into the pack-up food they have brought with them, and they all have plenty left.
Before we leave London, we count them all in.
6.50pm the train departs on our return journey to Hull, once again the food is still plentiful, and the kids eat until about 20mins outside of Hull - fantastic appetites! Games are played, stories of the great day and great experiences are exchanged and the long journey passes quickly.
The teachers give thanks to everyone involved, our HEYCU Lead then thanks the kids and the teachers in turn. We have made many friends on every experience and it’s nice when a school comes again and want to talk about last years experience.
9.25pm we arrive back in Hull and all the kids are reunited with their adults, we know because we count them all back in, and then we all go our separate ways. Until the next time, I can’t wait.
Thanks kids, thanks teachers and thanks to the HEYCU team.
We counted them all out and we counted them all in.
Thank you so much to our volunteer, Charlie, for writing such a visual description of one of our trips. If it has made you want to join our volunteer team, please apply today: Volunteer - Hull Children's University