Astrid and the other 6-year-oldse secondary school of the technical athenaeum of Hal will remember for a long time their trip rhéto in Barcelona. If the stay on site was “went very well”the bus rides were adventures on their own.
A turbulent start
It was on Friday May 20 that the students of 6e renovated of the technical Athenaeum of Hal had to leave for Barcelona. The bus journey was to last all night and take them to Calella (near Barcelona) in the early morning.
But while the departure was scheduled for 7 p.m., the bus did not arrive until 9 p.m. And that was just the beginning of the problems. “As soon as we got on, we saw that there was a problem because two places were missing”, says Astrid. “In addition, the bus had not been cleaned and we might not use the toilets”she adds.
Cherry on the cake, “on the bus the roof opening was broken and it had rained so the seats underneath were wet”. Students have been able to solve this problem by putting towels on the seat before sitting down.
There remains the problem of the number of places. After having battled for long minutes on the phone with the company, two teachers had to resolve to give up their place to the students, to go to Spain by plane.
Once departed, the bus drove to its destination with no further problems.
A chaotic return
The stay on site was “went very well”, smiles Astrid with her head still full of memories. But when the time comes to get back on the bus to return to Belgium, the nightmare begins once more.
“The bus stopped following an hour and we had to get off”, the fault of the engine oil which was overheating. After a waiting period, everyone can re-embark and get back on the road… Until the next forced stop. There will be three in total before the bus runs aground, in agony, in Perpignan. “There was a problem with the water pump”reports the schoolgirl.
Normally, the journey between Calella (where the rhétos were) and Perpignan lasts less than two hours. They took six. “We left at 4 p.m. and arrived at the garage at 10 p.m.
But even there, the troubles are not over. “There was no way to fix the bus.” Stuck in the parking lot of a garage practically in the middle of the night… A professor will then start looking for a hotel with the owner of the garage who accompanies him in his car. A little stroke of luck comes to smile on the unfortunate: an Ibis hotel is not far from there.
Only, the chance will only be partial. The hotel is almost full and there are only a few rooms left. The least restrictive solution found by the teachers is to have the girls sleep in the bedrooms, three students per bedroom of two in order to be able to accommodate them all. The boys and the teachers had to spend the night in the bus.
“In the morning, we gave way to the boys so that they might charge their phones and rest too”, recalls Astrid. Very quickly, a new problem arises: they have nothing to eat and their stomachs are empty.
The good news is that “there was a Lidl not far away”the bad news is that to access it, “we had to walk along the highway. There was no sidewalk”. By scraping the funds from their pockets, the young people find something to eat. Stomachs are satisfied, but the bus situation is still not settled.
Astrid and her friends learn that a new bus is coming, but they have to wait. So their teachers roll up their sleeves:They found games and put on music to keep us busy. They took care of us”, underlines the young girl. “We also wanted to thank all our teachers who were very caring with us and who did everything so that we might change our minds a bit.“, she adds.
After another round trip on foot along the highway, this time to McDonald’s, to eat at noon with the little money they had left, the rhétos of the Athénée see their new bus arrive on the 4 p.m.
Exhausted by these adventures, the travelers settle down and can finally return to Hal, without any new story… But a day late. “We were supposed to return on Thursday around 10 a.m., we arrived on Friday around 7 a.m..”
“Now we laugh regarding it”, says Astrid, who celebrated her 20th birthday during the trip. “But at the time, it was boring (sic) because we were tired and we wanted to go back.”
The adventure, which ends well, will undoubtedly serve as a good anecdote for them for years to come. For the time being, the students of the Athénée Technique de Hal are concentrating on their exams which begin on June 8. The school did not wish to answer our questions.