a fairground life

Coatbridge went off without a hitch, the weather was almost totally dry for the two weeks. The new location of the fair seemed to make a real difference as there were more families in the park and less "wildlife". Biz was slightly better than two years ago and that is a first for this season. Sunday at 5pm the fair began to pull down. The crew had arrived on time and at 7:06 pm the skydiver, dropzone and show were all packed up. The dodgem truck was having trouble moving about so we towed it onto the path again with the six wheeler. Next we coupled up the DZ and spun it 180 degrees to face the gate. "r" took it away immediately so it would not block the path (only route in or out of the fair) and I followed with the Hobby caravan. We were at the yard about 30 mins later and shunted the loads in. Returning to CB we laid out the sheets of ply to make a roadway for the skydiver. The lorry picked away and made it to the path no problem. I took this away while "r" picked up the ply and packed it onto the pick up. Returning to the yard Blakey gave me a hand by guiding me through the gate. Its not as easy as it used to be as a cul-de-sac we used to turn the vehicles in has been blocked, so now we have to reverse in from the road on the jack knife. It took several shunts but we finally made it. "r" wasn't long behind and at 10 pm it was job done and back to the house for supper. So we have till Thursday before we move again, or so I thought. "r" and I returned to CB this morning to help take down the security fence, but when we arrived at 10am it was all packed away, what can I say-It's all in the timing! In the park were about a dozen coppers and two police range rovers, there was no trouble, it was an anti crime photo shoot. If there were that many coppers about all the time they wouldn't need an anti crime photo shoot!!!! Next we went to the yard to sort out some stalls for a coming event. It was then that the phone rang and we got the information that we were getting into the next gaff early, in fact right away. Taking advantage of this we got the DZ ready to move. We had to juggle the loads again as the yard was tight and if we had known we would be getting in early we could have put them in accordingly the night before. We also had to swap a couple of lorries over so the dz had a generator. For the first time the Foden took this ride. We arrived on site about 2:30 pm in the park. The ground was firm and we pulled onto the marked plot and began to build up. It was sunny and we built up fully in a couple of hours. That will be the ride there until it opens Saturday (only) for the pipe band championships.