When Loders School arrived at Leeson House everybody walked to the front of the coach talking about how excited they were. When everyone had got off, they ran to the back of the coach to collect their luggage. There was lots of pushing and shoving to get to their bags and suitcases.
When all of the stuff was in the games hall and they were all sat down on the floor, Dina a member of staff came in and talked to us about what we were going to do that day. The first thing she said was that we were going on a site tour to begin with and she also mentioned we had to put all of our wellies in the cloakroom. When we had finished our little talk we went out side. Mr. Kite took us in to the block of class rooms there was a library and a lab. There also was a classroom on the end.
by Helen
When we got there we carried the luggage into the games room. 5 minutes later we went up to our rooms. The fire drill followed. Suddenly we heard a really loud siren noise and it made me jump out of my skin and so we went down the emergency stairs and lined up outside in the garden.
By Ricky and Holly
Before we went to the stone museum we went to a local church because it was made of Purbeck limestone (which we was studying.) In there Reg Saville told us about Purbeck limestone. He told us the 4 things that the people made out of the limestone. They were for: Rich houses/ stick stands for poor houses so that the stick in the centre of poor houses don't move out of place. (Which makes the house tumble down.) / For grinding up herbs and spices. And finally for gravestones.
Then he told us that when the great fire of London burned, in 1666, they needed Purbeck limestone because it was caused by the houses that were made of wood, so they went to 2 men at Purbeck to ask for some limestone (the limestone is in 24 layers) other wise he was to be in prison. The old man said to the other man "I know, we can get our family together tomorrow so we can get the limestone."
But the other man said, "why don't we get the young men? Then we can do it faster!" The other man finally answered "because they want to be paid!" So they got together the next day. (also because they had loads of children.) But then they hit a problem. The problem was they needed to fix the whole of London, they would need the farmers land and the farmers wouldn't give up there land they need it for there sheeps, cows, spare field for cows, so that the other field can grow when its empty, horses, crops…
When they hit layer number 8 (it's called the grub) it was in massive blocks so they dug under the blocks, not to wide other wise they would be squashed. When they dug under the blocks they wouldn't need the farmers land because they could dig under it but every now and then the blocks fall down so they put the boys down there because they didn't have a family and they could have another one. Years after that an inspector came in this lovely costume.
When he got there he got there he had to climb over the wall (so that the cattle don't fall down because they can't bring it back up) Then he had to slide down 100 feet on his bum. He took out his torch but the tour man said "you need a candle you know when it's going to go out so you have enough time to get out but with a torch it just goes out without any notice. By the time the inspector got in the mines and saw he could get killed he was out in a flash and when he got back to London he closed down the mines. Another use of Purbeck limestone Reg told us was to decorate churches and cathedrals by oil or grease rubbed on the stone which makes the stone black and sometimes they would use layer 1 which is different from the rest because it has got fossilised snail shells on it from millions of years ago so they would get the oil rub it on an loads of black spots will come on the limestone! After Reg Saville told us this we went to a stone museum and Reg told us that they would put up wooden posts in the mines not to hold up the stone but to warn them if the stone was unsafe. And they would use iron cases to keep the rats off the candles because when they ate their lunch (because it was warm down there) they left crumbs.
Finally Reg Saville told us instead of carrying up the stones they would use a horse and they would make them walk in circles attached to a stick which turns around a chain which pulls up the stone.
By Kamran
In the evening we went to an observatory
When we went to the observatory it was really cool because we could see Saturn, Jupiter, Venus and the moon plus all of Saturn's 5 major moons. You can find David Strange's website here. My favourite planet was Saturn because of its rings. I also like Venus because it looks like it's glowing. Unfortunately we couldn't see mars because that would have completed the day/night.
by Tad