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California Dreaming...
Mrs Pearman sent this report:
Our cross-curricular Social Science trip launched this year, and what an amazing trip it turned out to be! After a lengthy 11-hour plane journey, we arrived in sunny San Francisco, exhausted but excited, where were greeted by what turned out to be, the friendliest and funniest coach driver! Tutti was her nickname, and she greeted us with several ‘Yee has’ to accelerate our excitement for the trip to come.
After a quick turnaround at the hotel, we embarked on a night-time tour of the Union Street shopping district, where we met some, somewhat interesting characters, including a man going about his shopping in a bright purple top hat, long tailed bright purple jacket, and extravagant gold chain.
Day 2 is where our tour of this beautiful city began, traversing the windiest street in the world; Lombard Street, and then onto either the Walt Disney Museum, looking at the history of this global business, or the Exploratorium to sample some of the social science exhibits, such as the workings of the human mind. After a lunch at the famous Fisherman’s wharf, we embarked on our visit to Madame Tussauds, where Taylor Swift, Beyonce and Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs and Barrack Obama greeted us. The highlight of the day was the video of all IGS staff recreating the famous line up from Brooklyn 99. We then walked along the San Francisco Bay to capture epic views of the Golden Gate bridge and sample the delights in the famous Ghirardelli chocolate factory, outside of which Hieu took great delight in jumping to pop some huge bubbles that a local artist was creating. We ended this very jam-packed day singing Happy 18th Birthday to Kish at the hard rock Café, what an epic 18th birthday she had!
Day 3, a wet and very windy trip was had to Alcatraz, where students were able to enter the cell of Al Capone and hear the history of the bird man. Luckily the afternoon saw huge change in the weather, so that when we arrived at Google plex we had stunning pictures of the famous building, where students were delighted to try out the infamous Google bikes. From there we visited Stanford university, were we toured this stunning campus, and avoided Mr Bridges breaking his neck whilst he took a group photo on Mr Gill’s shoulders!
Day 4, an early start was had by all for our mammoth 7-hour coach journey to Los Angeles, along the way Miss Reeves and Mr Bridges entertained the students with some epic quizzes, including, which teacher? Whereby students had to guess which teachers has a family connection with an Olympian, Louis Tomlinson from 1D and Clean Bandit, they found out what an interesting bunch we all are! Mr Gill, or should we say DJ Gill, then entertained the crew with an eclectic range of music, showing off his DJ skills on the coach PA system. Upon arriving in LA, we ventured on a 2 hour walking tour of the beautiful Venice canals, famed for such movies as Valentine’s Day, before walking along the Pacific coastline capturing beautiful sunset pictures, and visiting the Lana Del Ray mural before embarking on Santa Monica pier, where students were able to enjoy the rides and visit the Cheesecake factory to sample one of their 35 cheesecakes!
Day 5 saw us take a bus tour of one of the most expensive real estate in the US, where we were able to see the delights of Beverly Hills, the Hollywood Hills, the Valley, and nosey at some very famous houses, not least Adele, Denzel Washington, Gwen Stefani, The Rock and Keanu reeves, to name a few, unfortunately no celebrity spotting was done here (that was to come later!). We then divided into groups to tour museums; including LACMA, the automotive museum, The holocaust museum, and Le Brea tar pits, here students were able to immerse themselves into the academic areas of their choice. We finished the day in the beautiful shopping area of the Grove, coupled with amazing food at the original farmers market next door, where students were able to sample some of the best street food, it was here that students had their first celebrity sighting , Madison Bailey from the show Outer banks, although as staff we had no idea who she was, the students did, and she gracefully accepted taking selfies from this huge group!
Day 6 saw our epic trip to Universal studios, where students and Mr Bridges and Miss Reeves, could not contain their excitement to enter Harry Potter world and eagerly scoured every nook and Cranney! Students ventured into the new Mario world, Jurassic world, the mummy ride, to name just a few, the day was capped off by a trip to the Crypto area, to watch the LA Clippers, where we were greeted by their cheer team, and the students danced and cheered with them, before taking their seats to chant ; ‘let’s go Clipper, lets go’ ’before screaming (literally) at the sight if Kevin Hart courtside (our second celebrity spot!)
Day 7, our very last day saw a trip to the infamous Rodeo drive and then onto the citadel outlets, where students spent the very last of any dollars they had, before trying to cram their wares into their already full suitcases, including several very large soft toys purchased by the sixth formers!
The trip was amazing, made so by the staff and students who came. Our students behaved impeccably, for which we received numerous comments from cabin crew and passers-by at how nice and polite they were! For me personally, this was an epic way to end my career at Invicta, thank you for everyone that made this trip so good, and for those attending the 2024 trip, I hope you have just as an amazing time!
