On to Sunday, the morning
after the night before!
After gradually getting it together in the morning it was off to the ‘Spoons for some brekkie. Thanks Sam for that mate too
and we set ourselves up for the main event!
After gathering outside Bolton's well known Town Hall in Victoria Square we were joined by our special guest Bernie Smidowicz and his lovely wife Pauline and some of us who'd come up that morning. After the usual catch up and chatter we began exploring many of the locations in S&PW in, around or close by to the Town Centre along with some Fred Dibnah ones too including his old home, workshops and headstone too. RIP Fred!
1970’s-90’s redevelopments have certainly changed the town since the film was made – bloody A666, but and you can say this about pretty much
any town in and around this general Pennine region recent years don’t seem to have been kind to Bolton. For me it's a shame as when I worked there in the mid/late ‘90’s it certainly had a lot more of a buzz and energy to it than what it seems to have now! Maybe I’m looking back with selective nostalgia and working there is different to living and belonging a town like Bolton too. I just hope some of the newer plans and ideas to "revitalise" the town do bring some of that back in there as it needs it and on the whole I feel that Bolton and it’s people a sense of pride in their town and hopefully it deserves some proper reinvestment in it too. Also some of the locations we visited the locals were friendly and welcoming when we told them about the filming there kind of similar to what we had in the North East over the years!
Enough of that, it was off for a refreshment stop at the Ye Olde Man & Scythe a olde-worldly pub in the Town Centre. Great pub with a nice drop on tap and even managed to get a proper round in for almost the price of two pints in London – and even got a friendly laugh from the Landlord on that too.
Again it’s one of those places that would be a shame died due to the current financial situation and the way Bolton and the pub trade is at the moment.
Back on the locations mainly from S&PW in Queens Park, the family home on Grisdale Road (Deane) then off too (no laughing)
Nob End Country Park (Great Lever), before long it was the end of the afternoon and after saying some fond goodbyes to Bernie and Pauline and some of us heading home on the Sunday evening it was time for us to make plans for the evening too!
Manchester again and Wagamama’s at The Print Works where we started to wrap things up and thought about a few jars in an old favourite. However we did try to have these few jars in the Sir Ralph Abercromby which featured in LoM, however as it was a City/United derby it was closed, perhaps due to a few ‘issues’ lets say and a few of these ‘lads’ were hanging around and eyeing us up so wisely it was time to head back to the hotel and the bar their which seemed a safer and wiser bet than hanging around in Manchester. Football!
Back to Bolton and the hotel bar and most of us stuck around there for a good few hours past midnight and even managed to drink their best whisky
dry too.
As with most things it all goes too quickly, didn’t seem five seconds that it all began nor five minutes that the meet was announced in mid Summer either. After breakfast and goodbye's on the Monday morning it was time to also say goodbye to Bolton too. I had a look at a few old haunts and where I used to work in Farnworth which seemed to have recently been demolished and turned into a Volvo dealers, petrol station and erm… a Greggs and McDonalds. I suppose that’s progress and how it goes but I preferred it the way it was and employing a couple of thousand people at it’s height than what’s replaced it.
Ah well!
Once again and I’m not just saying this
massive thanks to Gene for putting this all together and as usual, making it work and making sure we get as much as possible out of the meet/weekend. As I’ve said before you’re the best in the business with this and whatever or wherever we do or go to next I’m sure it will be a bloody great weekend once again. Nice one mate.
A special word of thanks to Bernie and his wife Pauline too. Great people and company and I really enjoyed my chat over a few beers with you Bernie in the Ye Olde Man & Scythe especially you’re exploits in the business and our reminiscences about Bolton too. Smashing people and I wish you all
my very, very best! Thanks again to The Saint and Gene for sorting out the Uber’s and Wagamama’s in Manchester too it’s much appreciated especially at that point where things are wrapping up and all that. Thanks again lads.
Thanks to my Sunday driver ‘Gerry’ for doing the honours too, cheers pal and thanks again
everyone for making it a good time with plenty of banter and laughs along the way and for a few days at least giving a bit of a blow from the usual grind we all have to deal with. Sometimes for me it’s the friendships we’ve made and developed over the years which is more important than the film, TV show or locations we see over these weekends and you all contribute something good over the weekend too… well perhaps not that Dirty Epic…
Ah seriously had a great time with you lads and some good laughs too after what has been a pretty busy and let's say hectic period for me too.
I’ll have a good look now at the previous posts in this thread too as I’ve tried to put mine together without looking at these and wanted to share my own thoughts on the meet too.
Well that’s a wrap for
Bolton ’22 and another meet done, I’m very sure whatever we do next will again be another brilliant meet and once again
big thanks to Gene for his hard work on these over the years and the support of the Mod’s Sam, Saint and (an very missed friend) Del too.
See you soon everyone and all the very best.