Show Girls and Gladiators

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Wednesday night involved the first time I have had more than one glass of wine for a year - in fact I had four glasses! As you can imagine I was rather...happy. Mum and I went to see the 'Music Legends' show in the Green Room, and Dad was kind enough to buy us premier tickets. This meant that we had table service rather than having to get up to go to the bar all the time, a dangerous concept in itself. When we ordered our first drinks and 10 minutes later they still hadn't shown up, we had to ask the waitress again and discovered that she had forgotten our order. To make up for it she brought us back TWO drinks each, one of which was on the house - uh oh! Mum and I then spent a very pleasurable evening watching a sexy man, a not quite so sexy man, and two gorgeous girls singing their hearts out to the songs of some legendary stars and Jedward... They were backed up by four beautiful female dancers in skimpy little outfits. Mum and I of course, having had a few by then were sat at the front singing and dancing for all we were worth, and getting a few odd looks and laughs from the rest of the audience at the same time. But hey, we didn't care, we had fun! Stumbling back to the house we had a delightful converstaion with a resident owl that was hooting in the distance, and continued to sing the whole way. Ocean was being looked after by Jason for the evening so I didn't need to worry about her, but I must say I regretted it slightly at 5 in the morning when she woke up for a feed!

It got even worse when I remembered that we had signed up for the Gladiator challenge at 9 on Thursday morning. 8:00 arrived and I managed to feed the baby before we left. It was a cold, miserable, rainy morning and we were all kind of hoping that the challenge would be cancelled. No such luck though, so we made our way over to the sports plaza and got ourselves kitted out with a helmet and harness. We hadn't actually seen the challenge yet, and as we walked up to it I thought that I may have made a huge mistake in signing up for it. Standing 9 meters tall, the challenge consists of poles, nets and tyres - very much like the tree trekking except completely vertical. So as well as simply climbing 9 meters you have to deal with it being made that much harder by these 'obstacles'. My sister's friend went first, then my sister, and both reached the top seemingly effortlessly. Then it was my turn...

As soon as I began I knew I was in trouble. Being so short (5ft 4") I struggled to even get on the first log! Add rain to the equation, making the entire thing a whole lot slippier than it usually is, as well as the fact that I hadn't exercised in a year and I had no hope of reaching the top! I struggled up the wooden pole, made it up the cargo net and grabbed hold of the tyres. That was where it all fell apart! No matter how much I tried I just couldn't manage to actually get up onto the tyres that were permanantly rotating. By this point I was exhausted, my legs had turned to jelly and I knew that I couldn't make it any further. So down I came and almost collapsed when I reached the bottom as my legs gave way beneath me. Sitting down was the best feeling in the world after that! I watched the others complete the challenge, and though I was disappointed that I didn't make it to the top I was still proud that I gave it a go and got as far as I did.

The rest of the day was spent in the swimming pool, and then we went to Bella Italia for our final dinner. Friday morning was spent packing up, followed by more swimming, and then a parting meal at the Pancake House. If you've never been to an American style pancake house, you really have to. The pancakes are huge, with a whole variety of sweet and savoury fillings. I treated myself to the new Mexican style one, which contained meatballs, chilli beef, jalapeno peppers and cheese, topped with salsa and soured cream, mmmmmm. I have to say it was so delicious I am craving another one right now!

Sadly Mum, Dad and Sam had to depart then to get home at a reasonable time, so we said our tearful goodbyes and so ended our first family holiday...

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