Inferno

When the boys were little I quite liked theme parks. There were those memorable day trips, first to Lego Land, then, as the years passed, to increasingly challenging parks. Paulton's Park gave us our first taste of roller coasters and log flumes, and eventually we graduated to Chessington and finally Thorpe Park, with its rides designed to scare the living daylights out of you. Or rather, out of me. I'm wimpy when it comes to these so-called fun activities, and proudly so. I never minded waiting at the bottom with the coats and backpacks and sunscreen and water bottles. Actually, I quite enjoyed the gentle rides I went on with my little chaps, particularly the water rides, where we were soaked to the skin, and laughed until we ached.

But I've moved on, and so have they. So when I volunteered to accompany a school trip, organised by the Media Studies department, I had no idea that the three-day extravaganza included a day at Thorpe Park. With 150 or so 13-year-olds.

Day one was fun. A coach took us to London and we enjoyed a guided tour of the BBC television centre. Day three was fun, too. The coach took us back to London and we enjoyed a ride on the London Eye, followed by a guided tour of the fabulous Moivieum. The problem was

day two, the filling in the fun sandwich. That was spent at Thorpe Park.

If Dante were writing his Divine Comedy today, there is no doubt in my mind that he'd have come up with an eighth circle of Hell, and its setting would have been this particular theme park. On a "School's Only" day. In the middle of summer.

Imagine tens of thousands of excitable teenagers let loose in a vast garden of delights. Extortionate food and drink prices, outrageous queues for rides (

two hours to wait if you want to ride on Nemesis. Why would you want to ride on Nemesis?) Inadequate, insufficient toilets. And rampant, outrageous consumerism at every turn. "Win" a cuddly toy, just 50p a throw. But you will spend considerably more than the cost of the

toy in order to win one. A colleague secured a fluffy meerkat and was delighted. "How many go's did you have before you got the ball in the cup?" I asked. She looked embarrassed. "Far too many," came the reply. "This meerkat cost me about 25 quid."

It was a hot day, headache-inducingly humid. The whole park thumps and reverberates to the sound of over-bearing, overly amplified music. I can think of far more pleasant ways to pass my

time. Cleaning the kitchen floor, ironing, attempting to re-unite

pairs of socks...all these suddenly seem like a great way to spend a day.